Right This Time
by Javanyet
Summary: Overcoming your past is hard; deserving what you've got is harder. Mike Nesmith is just getting used to his new romance when his failed marriage comes to call, and he finds good intentions aren't enough to prevent bad decisions.
1. Echo

The impromptu script meeting had gone shockingly well, especially since it had been called just as everyone was leaving for their much-deserved two weeks off. The fairy tale idea had come from so far out of left field that _nobody_ was inclined to complain about it, especially since it involved no "romps", and _no_ music except "fairy tale" stuff. There was only one point of contention... everyone wanted to play the Princess Gwen, and the writers had Mike in mind.

"How come Mike gets to be the princess?" Micky whined. "I can do more voices than he can dream of!"

"Well YEW don't have the proper in-toe-NAY-shun," Mike delivered in a Texas-twang falsetto that sounded like it was filtered through ground glass. "THAT'S why." He finished with a sweet smile, finger pointed under his chin.

Davy was pounding the table in hysterics, and Peter had almost fallen out of his chair. In the end, even Micky couldn't hold it together.

The three writers nodded and smiled mildly in agreement. They weren't given to raucous displays of enthusiasm. All of the unbridled wit and surreal circumstance in the universe may have dwelt in their heads, but it seldom made its way outside except on paper. Bob, who had barely sat down for the time it took to outline the episode, smacked his hand on the table.

"Done. We'll go into more detail when we get back from the break. Genie will be working on a few costume ideas, right?"

The head of wardrobe nodded grimly. "I will be slaving by my candlestick in my garret, night and day." Then she burst out laughing. "Tall Boy, I am going to enjoy this so much I might feel guilty for getting paid."

"I _heard_ that," Bob called over his shoulder as he headed down the hall.

"Yeah but Bonnie's not here to witness it, and we didn't hear _nuthin_," Micky yelled. This brought Bob running back.

"That reminds me, when are you guys getting back from New York?" he asked Mike.

"Beats me… she's the master planner, remember?"

"Yeah, that's what I was afraid of… shit. Where you staying?"

"Are you kiddin'? If I told you _that_ you'd be looking for a new princess. She said 'anyone who tells Bob how to find me will be singin' soprano on the next album.' And man, we _believe _her." Three other heads nodded readily in agreement.

"Don't worry Bob," Peter reassured him, "If they're not back on time I'll go looking for them."

Bob grimaced. "Wow. That makes me feel all better. I can see this is going nowhere. See you in two weeks." And he left for real.

* * *

As they passed the reception desk on the way out of the studio building, the receptionist waved a couple of message slips at Mike.

"Your service called, there's two more messages today."

He took them from her with a mumbled "Thanks" and stuffed them in his jeans pocket after barely glancing at them. He knew who they were from, and he intended to ignore them for as long as reality would let him.

Peter caught up with him as he stalked to the parking lot.

"What's up, man, you look like you just got your draft notice."

"Nuthin. I gotta get home, Bonnie's doin' her laundry and if I'm not careful she'll be washing everything that isn't nailed down." He slid behind the wheel and had cranked the engine up when he saw Peter was still with him, the tenacious bastard. "What? Gimme a call and we'll get together before break's over." To his surprise, Peter jumped in the passenger side. Mike killed the engine and turned to glare at his uninvited copilot.

"Bull. Shit." Peter said simply. "If you stuff any more paper in your pants the chicks are gonna have you for lunch." No smile was forthcoming from his friend. "Seriously, man. Every time you get handed another message the clouds over your head get darker."

"Busted. But I'll figure it out."

"What is it, money?" It had been coming in pretty steadily, and he knew Mike was getting additional royalties for songs on the albums, not to mention stuff he'd written previously that was being covered by other musicians. But he also knew Mike had a taste for the "finer things", like fast cars and that fancy music studio at his house, and high-priced wines. Everything that was the opposite of his dirt-poor childhood. Not to mention that mind (and wallet) blowing night on the town he'd rigged up for him and Bonnie that last night in Paris last week. So it wasn't too far out to think he might have spent himself into a hole.

"Money?" Mike laughed out loud. "Man, money is easy." Then he looked thoughtful, and then angry. "Shit, that has to be it! We're raking in the dough now, and she wants in!"

"_Who _wants in?"

The anger in Mike's face was diluted to annoyance, and not a little disbelief.

"Phyllis, man. Six messages in the past three days. She keeps calling the service, sayin' we need to talk about something to do with the settlement. Now I'm thinking she wants a bigger cut."

* * *

Peter sat back hard in his seat. He'd been friends with Mikes' ex, as much as he'd been with Mike, in the very early days after the show had been cast, when the salary and royalty advance checks had them all running to the nearest realtor. There had been some outtasight barbecues at his place and Mike's, just the guys and various girls-du-jour, some staff. It was before anyone knew Bonnie very well, when she wasn't even seen outside of the studio. Good times… but they hadn't lasted for long. Mike's taste for the young (and younger) women who came with their very newfound fame was developing fast, as was his rage at discovering that the musical limits of his contract were, in fact, real. The two combined to burn his marriage to the ground. No, not burn… it exploded like napalm on dry grass. The ink was barely dry on the bill of sale for the glass-faced house on Crescent Drive when Phyllis Nesmith packed her bags and split, lawyers in tow. To everyone's surprise she didn't clean him out, though his repeated, casual infidelities and black moodiness gave her plenty of ammunition. It was "mental cruelty" in court _and_ in real life, but nothing more on paper. Oh, he'd never raised a hand to her… he didn't have to. In the end she was beaten down by her need to get out, and his apparent indifference. She applied only for enough alimony to support her at the level they'd lived before he got the show, which was nothing to write home about. Mike agreed without complaint, though Peter had the feeling at the time that Mike didn't really understand why she was leaving. He was so involved in his own head that nothing outside of it made much of a difference to him anyway.

"There's no room left there for anyone but Michael and his anger," Phyllis had confided to Peter in despair the week before she left. "The girls, the groupies, I know they're no more to him than vodka is to a drunk. But there's no room there for me, not in that house, and not in Michael's life. Peter, I'm _better_ than this." She'd broken down and cried as she admitted it, and Peter had hugged her and told her she was right, and to take care of herself. He had never seen or heard from her again in the year and a half-plus that passed. Though he found it hard to believe she'd turned gold digger, he had to admit he couldn't guess what that kind of painful struggle, and admission of defeat, could do to a woman who had been through all of the "worse" of her marriage only to be left in the dust when things were turning better.

Not that Peter credited Mike's new relationship with turning him around. Even Peter, the philosopher of the bunch, wasn't naïve enough to believe that one person can work that kind of magic on another. He'd been able to see Mike's rage for foxy strangers and for, well, _rage_, burning itself out gradually in the guy who'd turned out to be a natural, if difficult, friend. He really thought that Mike and Bonnie had just crossed paths at the right time, which he figured was magical enough for any two people. What it seemed to bring out in both Mike and the woman who had first seemed to be determined to run from any close connection looked like a good thing for both of them. Even the jagged parts of them seemed to match each other where they couldn't match anyone else. He knew Bonnie well enough by now to know that she hoped that some of what Mike was able to find in himself when they were together would make the leap to his attitude in general, but that seemed to be slow in coming. All the same Peter could see his two friends were far more than the sum of their parts, and for that kind of thing no one person could take credit. It just happened as it would, and nothing could explain its presence or its absence, or its timing.

* * *

"Why don't you just call her and find out," Peter suggested at last. "I'm not sure why she called your service, anyway. Maybe she's trying to give you some space here, not to ambush you, you know?"

"You think too much, Pete. I changed the number after I signed the papers. The studio won't give it to anyone lower than God, and even then they ask for a password." He pounded the steering wheel in frustration. "_Damn! _Things are just starting to hit a groove with the show, with the Grammy and Emmy, and that music we played in Paris." He calmed down then, and his voice got quieter. "And me and Morris, Pete I think I finally have a chance here to get it right, y'know? Not perfect, not God's gift, but sometimes there's this look she gets, and it just tells me. Man, I don't _need_ this trouble!" Peter looked at him with steady eyes, and he couldn't look away.

"You want to do it right? Then call her. _Wanting _to do it right doesn't mean shit. And where Phyllis is concerned, you discovered new ways of doing it wrong that experts still want to study."

"Well _gee_, Pete, thanks for all of that peace, love, and moral support."

"Just telling it like it is. You want bullshit, you can go to anyone outside of this car. Except Bonnie, I mean. What does she think?"

"Haven't told her, man. We're just getting' ready to go to New York so she can meet up with her friend Ari again, maybe make some peace with those pieces of her past she left behind. Now here comes _my_ past to bite me on the ass. Peter there is no easy way to tell her about this, no matter what Phyllis wants. Morris knows I was married, and she knows I was probably lucky to get out alive being the kind of sorry excuse for a husband I was. But she's still figuring things out, she still worries about what it all is, and what she's riskin', and whether I'm worth it. Man, there is no easy way to do this."

"Maybe not. But if you meant what you said, if you want to get it _right_ this time, maybe you gotta do it the hard way."

* * *

Bonnie was just about finished stuffing her sorted laundry back in her duffle bag, glad for even this diversion in exchange for having to go to work. She'd turned Nesmith down the couple of times he suggested she could move in. She wasn't ready to give up her place, still feeling the ice was a little too thin yet to trust it with the whole weight of her life. But free laundry using top-shelf Italian machinery… for _that_, she was in. The only rule he had was… don't touch his stuff.

"Nesmith I have done things to you that could get me arrested in several states, but you're freaked about me handling your undies?" she'd asked with a laugh.

"That ain't it… I just know how to do everything just the way I like it. It's not something you can learn or memorize."

"You mean like Zen."

"I mean like fabric softener and rinse cycles. So hands off."

She was beginning to learn what a closet fuss-pot Nesmith was in certain respects. But she could deal with it. Not, so far, inclined to _live_ with it, though. She'd dropped the full duffle on the floor with a thud and was smoothing the massive dent out of the chinchilla bedspread when she heard the door close downstairs.

"Hey cowboy!" she hollered out the bedroom door, "I starched your shorts, now you can really hit them high lonesome notes!" She waited for the requisite reply of "I ain't no cowboy!", lately amended to "_Goddammit_ Morris I ain't no fuckin' _cowboy_!", but heard nothing except the halt of footsteps near the front door. A harder sound than his high-topped moccasins, yet lighter than the Cuban heels of his boots. _Oh crap._ She crept to the bedroom door, and listened. Not another sound. Wishing mightily she knew where Nesmith kept the antique Colt revolver he'd mentioned more than once (and knowing it didn't work anyway), Bonnie made her way to the top of the stairs.

"The owner is gonna be back any minute," she called out in her most threatening voice. "And if he doesn't kick your ass, I sure as hell will!"

"Hello?" came the questioning reply. A woman's voice, with a genteel touch of Texas.

Bonnie cautiously descended the stairs, and stopped dead halfway down. Standing just inside the front door was a stunning blonde. No, not stunning, drop-dead, cover-girl, Vogue magazine gorgeous. Tall, blue-eyed, with long smooth golden hair and a figure and an outfit that made Bonnie feel, dressed as she was in cutoffs and one of Mike's dozen or so Triumph t-shirts, like Raggedy Ann descending on Glamour Barbie.

"Do you live here?" the blonde asked her.

"No. I'm just doin' laundry." She figured it was safer at this point not to say too much.

"You're the housekeeper?"

"Hell no." She padded barefoot the rest of the way down. "But I have a key."

"What a coincidence," the blonde said mildly, "so do I." Then she seemed a little embarrassed. "I'm sorry, I didn't expect anyone to be here."

"Then why did you come in?"

"I was going to leave a note. Michael hasn't been returning my messages. It's important I talk to him."

Something was coming together in Bonnie's head. It twisted into a tiny crystalline knot that promptly descended to her stomach.

"Well I work for the studio, I can pass on a message. Can I tell him who came by?"

"Tell him Phyllis came, because he wouldn't return my calls and I need to speak with him."

"Okay. Does he have your number?"

"Yes, but here's my card." The woman fished a business card out of her her zillion-dollar purse and handed it to Bonnie.

"If I don't answer it will go to my service. Tell him that _I_ return all of my messages. I'm sorry if I disturbed you. I'll let myself out." And she left, closing the door behind her.

Bonnie wasn't entirely surprised as she looked at the card, except by the deepening chill in her gut. Beneath the words _Floral Horizons,_ no-doubt a high end florist, was a name in elegant script:

"_Phyllis Nesmith_, _Assistant Manager_"

It had to happen sooner or later, she figured. _No, no it doesn't._ But it was happening now, ready or not.


	2. Feedback

By the time he pulled in the drive, Mike had pretty much succeeded once again in putting the multiple phone messages out of his mind. There was time to deal with this, whatever it was, when they got back from New York. He rambled in the door and tossed his keys toward the dining room table as he called out, "Hey Morris, you're not gonna believe what we're doin' next!" His keys slid off the edge of the table, and when he dove to catch them he caught a glimpse of white on the bare wood. When he stood up again, keys still in hand, he looked more closely.

_Shit._

The keys hit the floor again, this time left where they lay as he picked up the card and resisted the urge to jam it in his pocket with the phone messages.

"Morris, I gotta tell you somethin'," he called out.

He found her in the music room, slouched in a fat leather armchair and buried in one of her Zola novels. Zola had become her current favorite since returning from Paris. He couldn't help thinking it was appropriate, because things felt just a little sordid at the moment.

"Where'd ya find this?" he asked, thinking she might have come across it slipped under the door.

She looked up at him, only a little bit not the same as usual. "I didn't 'find' it. It was handed to me. I heard a noise downstairs and when I got down here, there she was. Let herself in with her key, she said."

"Damn, why didn't I change the locks? I only changed my _phone_ number."

"Well I don't think she came here to rob the place. But it was a real Rod Serling moment, I'll tell ya." After a moment or two of silence she said, "Stop, okay?" There was the faintest hint of annoyance in her voice.

"What?"

"Stop trying to _read_ me. If you wanna know something just ask. You're not gonna pull it out of my brain through my eyes no matter how hard you try."

He sat down on the ottoman, holding the card in front of him. "So what happened?"

She considered this. "Hm. What happened. Well if you mean did she spit fire and did her hair turn into snakes when she saw me, no. And I didn't scream and faint. She asked if I lived here, though. When I said no she thought I was the housekeeper. That one was my fault, instead of telling her my name I just said I was doing laundry."

"Why didn't you tell her who you were?" He looked a little concerned, and she sat up straighter and dropped the book on the floor with a bang that could blamed on gravity, not attitude.

"Well lemme see, Nesmith, one minute I'm matching my socks in your bedroom, and the next I'm staring into the perfectly-made-up face of your past. And all she did was say she needed to talk to you and that you haven't been returning her messages, and she gave me her card. And apologized for disturbing me, and left. A shocking deficit of drama, for real. But I still was lookin' for ol' Rod to come stepping out of the pantry to explain the whole scene." It had shaken her up more than she was about to admit, because she couldn't have explained exactly why.

He gestured vaguely with the card. "I don't know what to do… she just started calling my service out of nowhere a few days ago, left a million messages."

"Here's a thought. Why don't you call her and find out what she wants. My bet is it isn't money because she was dressed like a hip Mrs. Astor."

Mike shook his head, rubbed his eyes, and looked at the card again. "I just don't get it. She mentioned the settlement… the lawyers handle that." There was something else, too, but that had better be left to lie for now.

"Look, maybe she wants some of her stuff back, you said she left a lot of books and some of the deck furniture. Maybe she got a bigger place with her flower gig. I don't know, whatever divorced people want to talk about after a couple of years. I'm not up on all that."

"Well neither am I," he informed her, "this was kinda my first experience too. I haven't heard from her since."

"So do what civilized divorced people do, call her and figure out what she wants and holler in the lawyers and shazam. It's done." He said nothing, so she leaned closer, "_Right?_ It'll be over and you'll step back out of the Twilight Zone and we'll go to New York on Thursday."

_Tell me you love me_, she begged silently, unreasonably. _Tell me I have nothing to worry about even though I'll laugh and say why would I worry about someone who's been gone for almost two years? Why would I worry about a whole other life that happened before we ever tripped over each other in the studio corridor? What in the fucking __world__ could worry me about the woman who left the asshole you were meeting the man you are now, who wants to deserve love and earn it, instead of stomping all over it like a cockroach? _

"I mean c'mon, just take care of it and it won't be hanging over my head any more."

He caught that. "Huh? You just said hanging over 'my' head. You sure this didn't freak you out some?"

"Please, after the week I've had it'd take more than an ex wife to freak me out."

_Please… I'm a pretty good liar but don't believe me this time. Do what you do when I have a bad dream, hold me and tell me it's just a crappy movie, that you're here and it's all groovy and safe…_

"Wellll, okay." He didn't believe her, not completely, but didn't want to get into that debate right now. He also didn't want to tell her that only one of the messages mentioned the settlement. Most of the others just said she, "we", should talk about "things". He couldn't for the life of him think of any "thing" that hadn't been stabbed through the heart and left for dead once the papers were signed. Money, property, future earnings, all of it tied up nice and neat, unlike everything else about their ruined marriage. But even what wasn't tied up nice and neat was left for dead, and no one had turned back to check its pulse since. "You just keep readin' up on the decline and fall of the French gin mills, and I'll call Phyllis. Then I'll throw a couple of steaks on the grill and check all my stuff to make sure it's right where I left it before you fired up the washer."

As he rose, he leaned forward, hands braced on the arms of the armchair. "_Te amo_, Morris." When she turned up her face to smile at him, he caught her mouth with his. "Gotcha."

* * *

"Hey. It's me. Sorry about the messages, it's been real busy since we got back from Paris."

"_Of course. How are you, Michael? Did your friend give you my card?"_

"She's not m'friend, Phyllis, it's way past 'friends'. And I'm doin' well, which I imagine is why you called."

_"Actually I wanted to tell you I can do with less money now that I've been made a partner at the shop. Very upper-upper clientele, we're extremely successful. I'm renting a lovely little house near Malibu."_

"Well that's great, Phyl. Good to hear."

_"I see the show is really taking off, and your live concerts are selling out everywhere. I hope that's making things easier for you."_

"If you mean am I still punching the walls, yeah I am sometimes. But it's getting better." He paused, and decided it was stupid to talk like strangers. No matter what else they'd been they would never be strangers again. "I think something's calming down. I don't know why. But I think I'm just tired out by all the swinging in every direction. I'm still crazy wanting the same things that this damn show won't give me but there are times it'll leave me alone for a while. I guess I'm finding more reasons not to act like the asshole you married." _There. He'd admitted it to himself a long time ago. _

"_I'd like to get together sometime. Just for a drink, or maybe to visit the studio and see how it's all doing. Maybe you and Peter can find some time… how is Peter?"_

As often happens when couples split up with the kind of wildfire acrimony he and Phyllis had, one party tends to get custody of the friends. Given the general situation of the show, Mike had gotten Peter by default. "Pete's fine. 'fact, he's better than fine, he's probably the only one of us Bonnie doesn't have to crack the whip at to keep him in line."

_"Bonnie… oh yes, Bonnie Morris, I've seen the name in the press. She works for Bob. We've never met, she'd only just started when… things happened."_

"You met her today, in fact."

_"Oh… that was Bonnie. She's… I see."_

"Anyway we're going to New York for a couple of weeks, to see some old friends of hers. Groovy music, in the Village. Nobody can figure out how Bonnie and her friends never ran across Pete back in the day. You can catch up with Pete 'n' me when we get back, it'll be back to taping but we can figure something out."

_"Oh. Well I'm only away from the shop until next Wednesday, we've just had builders in to remodel. That's why I've been able to take some time off. Would it be possible for you to postpone your trip?" _

Was she high? Bonnie'd kill him… and besides he'd been looking forward to having a glimpse of her Life Before Monkees. "Nope, tickets are bought and we leave Thursday."

_"Can you join her later… maybe next Tuesday? That would give us the weekend to catch up. Michael, I don't have to lie to you. I'm not happy with how things ended and I know you're not either, ugly and cheap. We're both different people now, I think, and even in our new lives I'd like to think we could be at least a little friendly. I think it's time we made some peace."_

Well she was right about that, at least. "I dunno, Phyllis. Let me think about it, okay? And the money, you don't have to cut back. Just leave it as it is, okay?" _  
_

_"Well all right, for now. I'll wait to hear from you. Don't worry if you can't do it, like you said, we can figure something out later."_

"Okay… 'bye Phyl. Sorry again for…"

_"That's okay, Michael. Goodbye."_

* * *

When Mike returned to the music room Bonnie laid the book down carefully and looked at him with what she hoped was calm curiosity.

"Well the money situation isn't gonna change," he told her. "In fact she wanted to cut it back, but I told her not to bother. I mean I told you, I was a world class asshole back then so I don't mind some payback."

"Uh-huh." She could see… something. Something in his eyes, something trying to find its voice. "Stop reading me. Just tell me."

"Well… she'd like to get together with Pete and me, just sayin' hi. Y'know, like civilized divorced people. She and Pete got on real well, back when… well in the beginning. Anyway, she said she's only able to get away from her flower gig until next Tuesday and wondered if… baby, don't say it's okay unless you mean it, but if I could fly out on Monday or Tuesday… it'd give us time to set things straight, like grownups, and then you 'n' me we'd have the whole other week and a half. You'd have that first few days to do all that catchin' up stuff, y'know?"

_"Pete and me"… it sounded so reasonable, so natural. He was right, wasn't he, why should people who had once been so close not set things straight, like grownups… but she could feel the little cold glass knot poke her with a few sharp, loose ends._

"Sure." That's all.

She didn't notice that she'd pulled her legs up on the chair, knees under her chin, arms locked around them, but Mike did. He'd never seen her tuck into the Armadillo Pose when she wasn't asleep, but there it was. As if she were protecting herself from predators.

* * *

Later that night when he noticed her crying quietly in her sleep, he didn't wake her. Not because he didn't want to reassure her, but because for the first time he didn't know how.

* * *

"_te amo" - _I love you - Don't worry, no extended Spanish lessons in this story!


	3. The opposite of silence

When Bonnie came downstairs, she found a note next to a thermos of coffee and the Monkees mug Nesmith had bought her as a joke gift last Christmas. "Drink up, I'll be back in a few." Next to the note was a scattering of the beach roses that grew wild along the dunes. She filled her mug and drank it straight. Its distinct kick made her smile. _He knows I like it d__ark and strong, just like my job._ He'd left the Times on the table, and she quickly was absorbed in the news of the real world. Her own world was getting the most of her at the moment, and she was craving a glimpse outside.

* * *

"Bon jour, I have here your pretty day-jernay," Mike's voice sang out as he came through the front door.

"If you mean _petit dejeuner_, aka breakfast, I'm in."

Mike paused at the cupboard to grab a plate and then laid out the freshly baked croissants he'd just gotten from the bakery a few miles away. Bonnie had become seriously addicted to the butter-laden pastries while they were in Paris, though they were hard to come by on her side of town.

"Hope this is okay, then."

"You buy even better than you cook." And he cooked seriously well, having proved it to Bonnie multiple times. After gulping down a mug and a half of just-right coffee and scarfing one of the croissants she announced, "Can you drive me home now? I have some stuff to get together before I go to New York." _Without you. _The words were unspoken but she took full-bitchery rights to the implication. "Can I ask you to carry my hundred-pound bag of clean laundry to the car?"

"Nope, not yet. Right now we gotta talk about what's going on."

Bonnie set her mug down with a little more force than necessary. "Whaddaya mean 'not yet'? What's there to talk about? You need to tie up some loose ends. Your marriage exploded in your face and like you said, it's time to set things straight like grown up civilized divorced people." She hoped he'd buy it, but now he was shaking his head, and was wearing that maddeningly wise expression that someone his age had no business wearing.

"You're doin' it again." Before she could insult them both by asking "What?" he continued, "You're not talking. And you're not listening either, but this time your plan is to shut me up in advance by tellin' me there's nothing to say. I'm not goin' through that again, Morris. We're just getting started and I know you have your doubts, and sweet Jesus you would be crazy not to. But this time we're gonna deal with 'em my way."

He'd busted her so thoroughly that Bonnie just stared at him, with nowhere to hide. "Fair enough. Can I have more coffee first?"

He laughed and got the pot, leaving it on the table after filling her mug again and pouring one for himself. "Y'know I'm beginning to think there is nothing in this world you can't deal with if you have your coffee first." He waited until she had another gulp or two before continuing. "You said it right on, my marriage blew up in my face, in both our faces. Maybe it was a bad idea to begin with."

She laid a hand on his arm and interrupted, "You don't have to tell me all of this, it's not my business."

"Yeah, I do, because now it is. I know it even if you don't." He was determined not to let her force that wedge of silence between them again the way she'd done after Chicago.

"I was twenty-one, and after six months in L.A. trying to break in as a musician I had a crap-paying gig at the Troubadour hosting hoot nights. At least they let me play my stuff, and it got me hooked up with that little label deal for a few recordings and some songwriting stuff. Phyllis was nineteen then, she'd been in town not much longer than me, but had already scored a gig with a modeling agency in Hollywood. No surprise there, you got a good look at her yesterday. Back then she'd come to the club with her friends, sometimes on Hoot nights, and one of her friends introduced us. Any other time it wouldn't have led to a damn thing, she came from money and I came from dirt poor, she was drop dead gorgeous and already on her way to what she wanted, and I was nothing to write home about for looks and was stuck in neutral. But she liked my music, and I sure liked her looks. And both bein' from Texas, we were homesick as hell and here we were, meeting the only other Texans we'd found in L.A. It seemed like a good enough reason at the time."

"You're telling me love had nothing to do with it?" She knew better, but couldn't stop herself from asking.

"Hell yeah, sure we loved each other, at least we thought that's what it was. Sounds stupid to say it now, but we never figured that looks and music weren't enough to keep that honeymoon goin'. A couple of years later, she was still modeling. I was still hosting hoot nights and wondering how the hell I'd wound up with a wife and a rented house with bills we couldn't pay no matter how many pictures got taken of her. I started feeling mean, toward everything, and being supported by my wife didn't help my attitude, though we'd sure as shit have been out on the street if she hadn't. By our fourth anniversary we were running out of things to celebrate. Then I answered that ad and got the show, and the money started coming in. Phyllis stopped working and became a housewife, and I _started_ working and became a guy who didn't want a house _or_ a wife. I can't say for sure that she really wanted that whole cooking and cleaning and House Beautiful scene either, that's about how well we knew each other even after four years together. But I know she was trying and I didn't figure I had to. The groupies and the money and the whole world-at-your-feet thing, well I guessed I'd worked long and hard to get there, and if that was part of the payoff that was groovy. I took it all and ran with it, just like the other guys. That included all the women, girls, groupies we could handle… I figured I wasn't grabbin' anything the other guys weren't, so what was the big deal? 'course I managed to ignore that I was the only one of us who had stood up in front of a preacher and promised _not_ to. But as long as I was paying the bills, and comin' home at night, and Phyllis finally was able to dress up fine and go to big events on someone else's dime for a change, then I figured I was doing my part."

Bonnie could see that recounting the whole ugly business was painful for him. Who wants to remember so clearly when the worst parts of yourself were in charge, let alone tell it to someone else?

"Nesmith, you don't have to... I think I get the picture."

"Yeah, I think you do now. Up til now you only got the highlights. Well the end of the whole sad mess was my mean-ass moods added to the mix, and Phyllis split just after the first half of the first season was on the air." Suddenly Mike's pensive expression turned more intense, and he leaned forward and told Bonnie urgently, "I never hit her, I want you to know that. It may not count for much, considering how messed up the whole scene was at the end, but I want you to know I never did."

"I believe you."

He could see it in her eyes, she was telling the truth. "I don't ever want you to think you need to be afraid of me."

"Never, I swear." Of all the faults she was aware of in him that could pull the rug out from under her, that had never been one of them.

"Okay, good." He sat back, and finally downed his own coffee. "So here's where we are, Morris. Phyllis is back and wants to smoke the peace pipe. Funny it's her askin', after all the shit we went through. But if she's giving me an opening to settle up for even a little of the damages, I owe it to her to give it a shot. I laid hurt on people I may never see again, but Jesus, if all it takes is a beer and a grown-up conversation to make up for even a little of it, what else can I do? I know this scene is hard for you. I know her showing up right now, right when we're startin' to figure things out, well the timing sucks worse than bad. And I know it hurts that you're gonna go back to New York without me, even for a few days. I swear to _God _I wish I could change that, but I can't. I was talkin' to Pete about this yesterday and I told him there's no easy way to handle this, I know no matter what I do it's just not gonna be easy. So he told me to quit the bullshit and if I wanna get it right I might have to do it the hard way. And this is it. I'm sorry, baby, and I'm sorry if I'm making it more of a big thing than you wanted it to be. I'm doin' the best I can with what I got."

She looked at him, seven years younger than her and carrying more hard truths about himself than anyone _older_ than she was should have piled up by now. _He's trying, I know that. _But in the far reaches of the back of her mind, the words "_til death do us part_" were whispering. She couldn't help but believe he was as sincere then as he was now, but sincerity wasn't the same as understanding. Not of yourself, or of what you were getting into. _I wish I could jump back six years and look in his eyes, because they're always where the truth lies._ Yeah, well, if wishes were horses… maybe cowboys would ride, and neither one of them was a goddamn cowboy.

"Okay. I'm sorry I tried to keep you from telling me, and you're right. I do have my doubts about things." She was quiet for a minute, then told him, "Look… we both know how we started was by talking and listening. That's one up on looks and music, at least I hope so. Believe it, I trust _you_, it's _life_ I don't trust. Life can take things from you that people would _never_, and you don't always see it coming."

He picked up her hand and kissed her fingertips. "Then we'll just hafta pay extra attention, so nothin' sneaks up on us. Deal?"

"Deal. So. Coffee's gone, that means I'm outta here." She waited until he smiled. Their Deep Talk was officially over. "Can you bring down my thousand pound bag now?"

"You said _hundred_ pounds a few minutes ago."

"Socks breed like jackrabbits, I figured a Texan would know that."

"Then I better get a move on before we need a winch." He disappeared and reappeared in moments, grunting a bit dramatically as he dropped the duffle to the floor. "So I'll get you to the airport on Thursday. Four o'clock, right?"

"Yeah. You can call Pan Am and reschedule your flight for whenever you're coming out."

Mike followed her to the car, locking the front door while asking himself why he was bothering. After all, the only "intruder" ever to have gained access had her own key (a situation Mike intended to remedy as soon as he could call a locksmith… "making peace" did not include full access to the house). He loaded Bonnie's duffle into the trunk of the Cobra, barely managing to mash the lid down. Before Bonnie could duck into the passenger seat, he pulled her back and leaned down to murmur against her cheek, "_Te amo siempre._"

Even after everything they'd said, and the way that tiny crystalline knot in her gut still poked at her, she could feel her knees turn to water as the words buzzed against her skin. _Damn you, Nesmith. _She covered by telling him, "You know French is my only other language, what does '_siempre' _ mean?" She understood the first part.

"Always."

She dropped her forehead against his arm for a second and breathed, "Oh, Nesmith…" When she looked up at him again and told him, "…be very careful what you promise," it was as much a plea as a warning.

"I know you don't believe it yet, but that's okay. It'll come." He gave her a kiss and waited as she got in. "In some few respects, I'm a very patient guy."


	4. Forced rewind

"Hey Myra, has Bonnie come in?" Peter asked as he entered the studio building. Bonnie was leaving day after tomorrow, and he knew she wanted to have a look at the Fairy Tale outline before she left. He hoped it'd be today, because he and the guys were doing a little freelance rehearsal on one of the sound stages. Peter also knew by now that she hadn't been staying at Mike's since the morning after Phyllis reappeared. He'd decided not to call her because he knew what he'd hear was "I'm fine, no big deal." Well, seeing was believing, so he wanted to grab a chance to see her before she left.

* * *

"_I don't know, Pete," Mike told him on the phone after he'd brought Bonnie home the day before. "She seemed to take it all okay, all my sorry story and the reasons why I'm gonna hang back here a few days before I meet her in NYC… but hell I can never tell for sure. Sometimes she's as good at keepin' things to herself as she is at talking 'em to death."_

"_Don't sweat it Mike, you're both doing the best you can."_

"_That's what I told her. Man when you said I'd have to do this the hard way you weren't kiddin'."_

"_Have you figured out when you'll see Phyllis?"_

"_You mean when you and me are gonna see her. That's what she said, and that's the way I want it. I said I'd call her after Bonnie was off. I just wanna shake hands and be done with it, y'know?"_

"_I can dig that. I'll see you tomorrow at the studio. You bringing Bonnie?" _

_There was a moment's hesitation. "Nah, she's been keeping to her place, and said she'll be in and out of her office, stuff to do and all that."_

"_Uh, okay. That makes sense, I guess… she can never turn off the work switch for long. See you tomorrow."_

"_Yeah she sure is a champion at 'making sense', isn't she? See ya."_

* * *

"As a matter of fact, Peter, she came in about half an hour ago, had me send a pot of coffee from the commissary." Myra's smile turned to a serious frown. "She drinks entirely too much coffee, if you ask me. It's not good for someone in her position… it makes her edgy and nervous."

Peter laughed and patted Myra's shoulder. She'd been on the front desk at Colgems for a long time, and had a motherly attitude toward everyone. "I'll make sure and tell her, but I don't think it'll help."

He was halfway down the hall when he heard Myra calling him back again. "Peter! Peter, you have a visitor!" The older woman was standing and waving him back, and pointing to a stunning blonde dressed in a high-end mod outfit.

He squinted as he trotted back… "_Phyllis_?" he called out, and she smiled brightly and waved.

"Peter! My God I'm glad you remembered what I look like, it's been so long!" She met him halfway and wrapped her arms around him in a warm hug. "It's so good to see you!"

Peter returned her embrace and kissed her cheek with genuine pleasure. "How could I forget a foxy babe like you, Phyl?" He stepped back to look her over. "Look's like life's been good to you."

"And I can say the same about you, Mr. Grammy winner and Emmy nominee!" She waved a hand around the fancy lobby. "Come a long way from auditioning through the back door, huh?"

Myra was looking a little uncertain. "Peter, would you like to sign in your friend for a visit?"

"Sure. Myra, you must remember Phyllis Nesmith, Mike's…" he hesitated.

"Wife," Phyllis finished. She answered Peter's uncomfortable look, "Well I _was_ the last time I was here, remember? I'm just back for a few days to visit, Myra. To lay some ghosts to rest, you could say, and have a look at what's new." She turned to Peter after he'd signed her in. "Do you have some time for me? I thought I'd have a look at how things have changed… do you mind?"

Peter looked over his shoulder in the direction of the production offices. "Well I was actually going to see somebody…" _Crap_. It would be a little awkward to say who, and why. "Okay, groovy, let's take a walk." He decided not to tell her about the casual rehearsal later on. Until Mike had a chance to talk with her, any unplanned reunions with the others would be a little awkward. After all,Peter had been the one who had made friends with her when the others were keeping their distance from what was obviously their new colleague's crumbling marriage.

After they got past the lobby doors and into the studio corridors Phyllis took Peter's arm and told him with a sardonic laugh, "I'm sure Michael told you I was in town. When he finally admitted it to himself."

"Hey, be fair, it's kind of a strange scene, you calling out of nowhere. And he's had, y'know, he's had a lot going on."

"Yes, I met her. Not to sound like a draggy ex-wife, but she's a bit older than his usual."

"I don't know what you want me to say, Phyl, you talking like that. Anyway for what it's worth he's done with that stuff now, at least it looks like it." He thought that might end this track, but he was wrong.

"You mean the love of a good woman has turned his life around?"

This was not what he wanted to hear from someone who was, after all, an old friend in spite of everything that had happened. "C'mon, knock it off, Phyllis. Fact is he was burning out on all that shit already. He and Bonnie just kinda stumbled into each other at the right time." He read her look and added pointedly, "Sober, and fully clothed. Look, is this why you came back, to quiz me about Mike's love life and make snide comments about someone you don't even know? Or to make some peace, like Mike said?"

She looked (almost) contrite. "I'm sorry. When I went out to the house I admit I was _expecting_ to see more of the same, 'evidence of strangers', I used to call it, though I'd find it on him, not in the house. I'll give him that much, he never brought them home. But at this point I thought there'd be some temporary young thing or things there, and to find someone like Bonnie Morris there was a surprise to say the least. The boss's assistant, c'mon Peter... is this what he thinks will get him the short way around Bob Rafelson?"

"It's not like that. " He hadn't planned to be sucked into this kind of conversation. "They're good together Phyl. Let's leave it at that, and change the subject, okay?"

"And Mike and I weren't."

"Well if you were…"

"If we were? Go ahead and say it. We wouldn't be having this little reunion chat because I never would have left. I can always count on you to tell it like it is, Peter. But that was then, and we're all grown up and well adjusted now. To a point. It's time for us to see who we've become since then, and if our lives might cross again."

Peter was staring at Phyllis, trying to gauge her meaning. Well if he was the one telling it to everyone like it is… "I don't think I have to ask who 'we' is. If I'm hearing what I think I'm hearing, you need to know that going back is not an option, and going forward is something we're all doing on our own."

"Not all of us, on our own I mean. What a shame I didn't have what it took to go forward, from the start. Or more likely that he just didn't want it then."

"I told you, nobody has saved or changed or fixed anybody. It just happens like it happens."

"You make it sound like an accident of timing, but then you believed life was like that."

"I still do. And you can't control karma."

"Oh Peter, still the philosopher. As for me, I don't believe in accidents," she told him plainly. Then her smile brightened again, a little too suddenly for Peter's comfort. "So show me the new soundstage. I'd like to see where the Emmy nomination was born."

Peter snuck a glance at his watch. Nothing would be happening for at least another hour, so he could have her out of there by the time Mike arrived. Better their get-together should be planned in advance. "Sure, I have a little more time. Most of the set's struck but there's should still be a little vibe left over." It looked like he wouldn't have time to hook up with Bonnie, but maybe that was a good thing. In light of what he'd just heard, his mental script had just gone out the window anyway.

* * *

Half an hour later Peter kissed Phyllis goodbye near the soundstages after giving her a line about having to listen to some tracks they were thinking of using for a new record. She assured him that she could see her own way out.

"Michael said he'd be in touch about when we can get together," she said with a smile.

"Can't promise anything, Phyl, we're working on new music and wanna talk over the new episode, just us guys at Mick's place probably."

"If you can't make it don't let it bother you."

"Oh, I'll be there," he promised. "Whenever it is." Whatever her motivation, he could tell Phyllis was looking for something that, even if it were possible to find, would be a very bad scene for everyone. People and time couldn't be remixed like music; what was wrong before stays wrong, you can't bring it forward to re-edit it and make it right.

* * *

Bonnie was tidying up and getting ready to leave when she heard the knock at the door. "If that's you, the sugar's gonna have to wait. I got stuff to do."

"Excuse me, but I think you were expecting someone else."

The door opened, and in walked the blonde goddess who had taken just forty-eight hours to fling into chaos the part of Bonnie's life that she had _almost_ managed, after seven or eight months, to bring into balance.

"Oh, sorry, yeah. What can I do for you, Miss, uh?" Bonnie realize she had no idea how to address her. She certainly wasn't going to call her Phyllis, but didn't know her maiden name. Did women take back their names after they got divorced? She'd never even thought about it before.

"Mrs. Nesmith, unless you'd like to call me Phyllis?" Each syllable was drawn out until it dripped honey.

_Good lord._ Bonnie could recognize the "ramp up" of the Texas accent, just the way Nesmith did it when he was pouring it on to make a point.

"Well, I'm kinda in a rush, how can I help you? Nesm- Mike said he'd called you back."

"He did, but things were left a little vague. I just ran into Peter, and was wondering if you could tell me if Michael is coming in today too? I understand you're the keeper of the schedules, right? Do you know if he'll be here? Maybe he told you this morning."

Bonnie went back to shifting files into her desk drawer. "I didn't see him this morning. And what the guys do on their off time, I don't keep track of. So if there's nothing else?" _Go away go away PLEASE go away, I'm not good enough at this to last for long._

"No, thanks very much. Have a wonderful time visiting your friends in New York. Michael's just taking a few days to catch up with me, to settle some things."

"He told me, thanks." Phyllis still stood inside the office door, looking at her as if she were a curious artifact. Not rude, just casually interested. Finally Bonnie asked, "I'm sorry, was there something you wanted to say?"

"I just don't want you to let this worry you. My visit, I mean. Just because divorced people have history, and I'm sure he's told you about some of ours, it doesn't mean…"

Bonnie stood up and looked straight at her. When "Mrs. Nesmith" had appeared, she hadn't felt particularly uncomfortable, just a little confused. The mix, however, was beginning to change.

"I'm not worried. You guys knew each other way before I got here. What happened isn't any of my business, and what you have to settle isn't my business either."

"So he didn't tell you about it, about what happened?" It was plain she was ready to inform Bonnie what a wild card she'd been dealt, under the genteel guise of Texan ex-wifery.

"To be honest all I knew until a couple of days ago was that awhile ago he was married, and now he isn't. Like I said, it's not something I consider my business. As for his other kinds of past, he's been pretty clear about that, and that doesn't worry me either. Time goes on, people change, all that jazz. I'm glad you're in the peacemaking groove, really. So have a nice visit with Pete and Mike, and I'll be going now."

Phyllis was halfway out the door, when she turned again. "Has he taken you to the Troubadour?"

Taken aback, it took Bonnie a second to respond. "Yeah, once or twice."

"Tell Jimmy hello for me, next time you're there." She left then, without actually saying goodbye.

_I wonder if that's how she left him… a last, carefully crafted line before the exit? Nah, doubtful. You do that to impress strangers, not spouses._

Bonnie sat down hard at her desk. This all seemed so _soap opera_. This stuff just didn't happen in real life, did it? The bygone wife coming back to revisit the past, to civilize it with new improved characters, rewrite it in the present tense? No, this felt more like science fiction, about the time machines we have in our heads, that we believe we can take the people we are now and bring the past forward and do it all differently. That sci-fi attitude frankly scared her more than any soap opera plot.

Davy popping in the door startled her. He _never_ knocked, usually hoping (in vain) to find her and Nesmith wrestling on the desk. Ammunition for future hassling was worth its weight in gold around the studio, and Davy was a determined miner. This time, though, he just overplayed his astonishment at finding her at work.

"Blimey, don't you ever take a break?" he gasped. "You see any of the other blokes? We have a practice planned."

She rolled her eyes and griped, "I _don't_ babysit you guys when you're off the clock. Like I just told the former Mrs. Nesmith."

"Oh, right. Just saw her on the way out." He lowered his voice to a conspiratorial whisper, and leaned forward. "Not exactly cuddles and smiles, we weren't. Didn't like me habits with the ladies… thought I was a bad influence on her can." When Bonnie stared blankly at him, he explained, "You know, the cockney slang, garbage can – man. She's right a'course, I was a _terrible _influence."

"Well from what he's told me he didn't need much. Look I'm trying to get out the door, I got stuff to do." And Phyllis had just left her a little more rattled than she wanted to admit, and she was getting worse at hiding it. That was one of the reasons she'd retreated to her place from Nesmith's. Really, it was much easier to pretend you weren't becoming a mixed up mess when nobody could witness the process.

_That and the fact that my repeated "no thanks" to his invitations to move in are being openly laughed at since I spend so much time there already. Just another thing I'm making harder, which I find easier to admit in the middle of the night._

"No offense, just go tune your maracas or something, okay?"

But instead of breezing out as she expected, he leaned closer over the desk and looked her squarely in the eye. Before now she'd seldom noticed much behind the usual show biz sparkle and glint, so what was visible now took her by surprise.

"Look Bonnie, I know you have lots of rubbish dancing in your head right now. But I was there, we all were, and we saw how it was. A wife was something Mike had, and a home was something he went to. Like he was outside it all, see? But what he's into now, he's _into_, get it? He's inside of it. What was back then, even a couple of years ago… that's not something you go back to. It's something you make peace with, if you can, or else you just leave it." Then the sparkle and glint returned as he stepped back out the door and pointed to the hallway beyond. "Now get on with ya, before y'leave me reputation in ruins."

Bonnie was well aware that David Jones wasn't given to rash displays of emotion when a smile and wink would do.

"David…" she began. But something in the brown eyes smiling back at her repeated, _"Get on with ya."_ So she said, "See you in two weeks. Stay outta trouble, if you can."

He flashed a devilish wink. "No promises!" But his smile warmed for just a second before he jogged away.


	5. Pause for segue

Bonnie was waiting for the bus when a tall shadow fell across her.

"Hey there. Your car, truck, _and_ Triumph break down?"

Mike sat next to her and draped his arm along the back of the bench, hand dangling onto her shoulder. "Nah. Just lookin' for some sugar, you got any?"

That request usually made her smile; she didn't quite manage it this time. "Hmm, I've been running low myself, but I got a little left." She reached a hand to his head and pulled him closer for a kiss. When she let him go she asked, "How'd the music go? Any casualties?" With the new, admittedly limited, musical freedom granted them the guys sometimes found themselves butting heads even in pursuit of their common goal.

"Very funny. There's some different ideas goin' on but we're hitting the groove." He lifted his shades and looked closely at her. "How 'bout you?"

"I read the new episode outline. You're gonna kill 'em as Gwen… and I'm gonna get a stash of production stills to sell on the black market and buy my _own_ cliffside mansion with the profits."

"That all?"

She sat back. "Is what 'all'?"

"Davy told me he saw Phyllis leaving your office."

It's not as if she didn't expect him to pass on the information, but she really wasn't in the mood to try to make sense of what were still some pretty mixed up emotions. She trusted Nesmith, and didn't know his ex at all, but what Phyllis had said when she "visited" was pretty straightforward. And what Bonnie knew about the way life worked would have been scary enough _without_ that.

"She flashed some attitude, I guess. She made sure that I knew that she got to the Troubadour first. Like that. Just ex-wife shit. But I don't get it, it's not like I'm young and beautiful or any of the usual dumbass clichés that would set someone off, or one of those groupies of yours. And especially someone who looks like her, who split all on her own a good long time before I really came along in your life, it doesn't make sense. It all seems, I dunno, _backward_."

Mike leaned his forehead against hers. "If you try to make it make sense you're gonna go crazy. I won't know what's up until we get together. And by 'we' I mean her, Pete and me. But for now, how about I call her and tell her to leave you the hell alone?"

"No! No, just leave it. Like you said, you'll know what's up when you see her." She huffed in frustration and plucked absently at his sleeve. "I'm totally lost. Maybe not working is bad for me. Maybe you 'n' me together mixing with the real world is weirder for me than I thought. I think maybe I'll be better when I get to New York and see Ari again." When he slid both arms around her she frowned a little. She was beginning to believe that no amount of his sincere attention would make this any less confusing.

"You're thinking this too much," he suggested. "How 'bout you come over tonight, we can talk more about this if you want, but 'maybe' leaving it alone for awhile is better. _Maybe_ it'll settle down some if you're not alone with all the beads and spangles, and everything rattlin' around in your head."

The frown bordered on an indignant pout. "I _like_ the 'beads and spangles'." They were part of the reason she resisted giving up her apartment, small as it was. It wasn't just hers… it was _her_. She was afraid if she moved into Nesmith's house she'd be leaving part of herself behind, no matter how much he wanted her there. Of course at the moment she was simply missing the point on purpose.

"Nice try." He had the Wise Look on. "Or maybe not."

"I _really_ need to be at my place tonight," she pleaded, "I'm not even packed yet and I leave tomorrow! I got _stuff_ to do."

Mike sat back and laughed. "I'm gonna break my own tradition and write a song just for you, called 'Stuff to Do'. That is your dodge every time you don't wanna deal with something."

_Damn._ He knew her way too well. "And what is it I don't wanna deal with, Smart Guy Songwriter?"

"Me." He dropped his shades again, and that scared her a little. He must have caught the look in her eye, because he pulled them off altogether and hugged one arm around her. "_Kiddin'_ Morris, it's a joke. How about this, I'll give you a lift home and you can get your stuff done, and I'll call later to see how your rattlin' head is doing. What? You don't like that either?"

"We both know if you drive me home you're gonna stay, or I'm gonna go back with you. So how about _this_: I'm a big girl, I'll take the bus."

"Okay, big girl. But I'm gonna call you anyway. And if you don't answer I'm gonna drive over and do some rattlin' of my own. Dig?"

"_Yes_ I dig. Jesus, Nesmith, I'm not falling apart here. I don't mind a night on my own."

"I do," he told her. "I kinda miss ya, y'know? Funny how you can get used to somethin' so quick."

The bus was coming down the street. "Yeah, funny. I'll call _you_ later, okay? Whether I'm rattling or not."

Mike stood and pulled her back for a kiss just as the bus stopped and the doors hissed open. Naturally most of the passengers noticed him right away, and a particularly eager one held up a camera and was poised to grab some great shots of a Monkee giving serious mouth-to-mouth in public. Mike extended the middle finger of the hand that was wrapped around the back of Bonnie's head.

"Try' sellin' _that_ one to the fan mags, fool," he snapped at the disappointed shutterbug as Bonnie got on the bus. She frowned at him through the window. His lightning transitions from sweet to hostile never ceased to amaze her. _Instant asshole – just add strangers._

* * *

It was barely five o'clock by the time Bonnie finished her packing and got everything organized for her trip. For the past hour she'd sat in the corner staring at the phone. She wanted to call Nesmith. She _needed _to call him. She was at loose ends, still confused by how she should be feeling. _Oh, fuck all that… I'm __lonesome_. She wasn't as fond of being on her own as she used to be. Even when they were in separate parts of his house, him in the music room working on tunes, her in the library reading, it still wasn't like being alone. Someone was there, someone who knew her and cared about her, and if she read something or thought of something that really caught her mind, he was there to share it with. And he always was interested, and the conversation took off. And it worked just as well vice versa. In the back of her mind she knew she was less afraid of Phyllis Nesmith than she was blindsided by the knowledge that even the _possibility_ of losing this connection made her feel sick, throwing-up kind of sick. But on top of that, really, she also was wondering how this woman she didn't know might try to play Nesmith's leftover guilt. It was there, or he wouldn't be doing this, letting her go to New York on her own while he "made peace", whatever that meant, with the woman he'd treated like crap (not so) long ago. Rattle, rattle, rattle… the noise inside her head threatened to deafen her. She picked up the phone, but instead of dialing his number she called a cab. She _missed_ him. He'd been the one to say it out loud, that there was something to be missed when they weren't together. Maybe he was right about her moving in; he'd joked more than once that her life was already there, but her stuff hadn't made it yet. All she knew right now was that she wanted to be there with him, she _needed_ to, because being with him helped to still the rattling in her head.

* * *

Mike called for the third time in five minutes. No answer. He didn't bother calling her service; he knew she was home. Well, goddammit, he told her he'd go rattle things and that's what he was going to do. He grabbed his jacket and keys, jammed his wallet in his back pocket, and strode out the door. And almost fell over Bonnie sitting on the porch steps with her going-away luggage.

"_Sonofabitch!_" Mike caught himself on the wooden porch rail and managed not to launch over her onto the gravel walk. She was startled, too, and let out a squeak of alarm. "Are you out of your _mind_, Morris?" he shouted, "What the hell are you doing here?"

"You said you _wanted _me here, remember?" His anger threw her; she thought it might be more than surprise. "I couldn't find the key, and I rang the bell a million times… then I figured maybe you were on the phone. Or busy with something, or…" She stood up then and faced him where he stood over her, still a little off balance. "I just wanted to be here. I'm sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt anything." She'd looked for any additional cars before getting out of the cab, but it was hard to tell in the dark, so she risked another glance around.

"Hey… _hey_." He turned her face toward him. "What're you looking for? I'm right here." She looked pretty upset, almost on the verge of tears. "I'm sorry, you just surprised me. I waited for you to call and figured I'd give you a little more time, I was listening to playback in the music room. And I called just a minute ago and you didn't answer, so I was gonna drive to your place, and do some rattlin' like I said." He ran his fingers along her cheek. "How long you been sittin' out here?"

She shrugged. "I dunno, not too long, I'm not sure." A shiver ran through her; nights up in the hills could get chilly and she'd packed her jacket for New York.

"C'mon." He grabbed her suitcase and smaller carry-on, and led the way back inside. "I changed the lock and didn't put a key out, tryin' to avoid any more unwanted visitors." Bonnie was still standing in the entry hall, her purse slung over her shoulder. "What's the matter?" He dropped her bags at the foot of the stairs and went to her. "Talk to me will ya?"

She dropped her purse and threw her arms around his neck. "Nesmith, I _miss_ you when I'm not here, I don't want you to change your mind about us…"

"_What? _C'mere and settle down." He led her into the music room and sat them both down on the sofa, reaching an arm around her. "Now why don't you tell me what's rattling in your head, okay?"

She stared at him for a minute, and ran her hands over her face, then tried to get it to come out right. "You know how you've been saying that my life is here already, just my stuff isn't? Well my 'stuff' isn't all that's at my place, I mean it's part of me, y'know? And since I came out here, it's the only life I had for myself, outside of my work with you guys, understand? It's all I had."

"Y'know, you got me now too. No mind-changin' about it."

She nodded rapidly. "I know that, or I'm starting to really know it. But everything here is _you_, you and… you know. I want to be with you, but it kinda freaks me out to be with _her._"

"Her stuff's waitin' to go, and it's _all _there is of her here." When Bonnie looked surprised he laughed gently and told her, "You're not the only one's been packing. I got Phyllis's books and records and pictures all wrapped up nice'n neat in a few boxes out back. I'm taking them with me when Pete and I go to see her. So that part's gonna be gone, and it'll be nothin' here but me."

"Well good, but still…" She was trying to find a way to tell him she didn't want to feel like a squatter in someone else's home and life, but didn't want to hurt his feelings.

"I know, that place in North Holly is all fixed up like you, it's got your vibe through and through. But I've been thinkin'… how about we take the library and you can turn on your vibe right there, beads and spangles and books and all? Turn it into Morris Central." He laughed again. "Hell, you can fit just about your whole place in there already, except for the furniture."

"You sure? Is there really room in this just-so glass palace for all that funky stuff?"

"There is room for all that funky _you_. I'll even throw in a stained glass window. How's that sound?"

"Sounds like home." She could feel her eyes fill up and felt suddenly self-conscious. "I wish she hadn't come back. Stupid, isn't it."

"Hell no, I wish the same thing. But she'll split soon as I can make it happen." He blinked at his own words. "I mean, this time…"

"It's okay, I get it." She looked out the window toward the canyon. "Wow full moon."

"And we're wasting it talkin' about a woman who is not you. Damn shame, if you ask me."

* * *

Five minutes later Bonnie was wrapped in one of Mike's sheepskin lined jackets, tucked against his side on the wooden glider on the deck. Her head was lying back against his shoulder, legs stretched out along the thick cushions as he rocked them idly with one booted foot braced against the deck rail, the black of the night sky washing into the glow of the city lights below them.

"How you feelin' now? Better?"

"Yeah." She sighed, this time in contentment. She felt his lips brush her temple.

"_Te amo_," he whispered.

"Mmm… how do you say 'me too'?"

"_Te amo tambien."_

"_Te amo tambien,"_ she repeated, but it didn't sound quite the same.

"Nice French accent there, _se__ñ__orita_." He started to laugh.

"Thanks a bunch. Spanish with a French accent… great. Laugh it up."

He tipped her face toward his and kissed her. "Just diggin' on the romance, Morris. Spanish with a French accent, a man don't know whether to be hot blooded or suave." They were quiet for a while, and then Mike started quietly humming a random riff he'd been working on. "Can't wait to get back to the Village and sit in with some righteous players."

Bonnie didn't intend to sigh but it escaped her anyway. She thought maybe he hadn't noticed. Fat chance.

"You need to stop worryin' about going back. It's gonna be fine."

She tried to sit up to face him properly but he squeezed her a little tighter, so she just turned her head a little. "Huh? Who's worried?" _Like that's gonna play._

"Don't even try. I can _feel_ that stuff rattling." He tapped her head lightly.

"So now you're a mind reader, huh?"

"As a matter of fact, I'm getting something right now." He spread his fingers through her hair and pressed his head against hers, holding it as if it were a crystal ball. "I see you wondering who's gonna still be there from the old days. And wait… I see you staring out the window of the plane, wondering if Ari is going to be proud of what you're doing, or secretly think you sold out but doesn't wanna hurt your feelings." She stiffened a little and he wrapped both arms around her again to keep her from pulling away. "Now just hold on a minute. Long as I've known you, as much as we've said to each other, you always act like you should be keeping stuff to yourself. Like it's not important enough for anyone to bother with but you, or maybe you think it'll seem lame."

She gave up. "Smart guy."

"Smart enough to remind you that we got each other from day one. Took awhile to catch, but it's too late to play mysterious with me, get it? You tell me not to read you, well I'm tellin' you not to hide from me. Deal?"

Another sigh. "Deal. I'm not exactly all worried sick, y'know." She shifted a little in his arms so she could turn her head against his chest. It was crazy how the sound of his heartbeat could erase the world when it crowded her too much.

"Nah, it's just weird, fast-forward time. Last time you were there the whole world had just changed for you, and since then it's changed again."

She knew exactly what he meant. "Yeah. What if we don't match up, new me and the old place? And Ari?"

"You will. I can just tell, you will. I only spent a few minutes with him, but there's no way Ari couldn't match up with who you are now, he wants it too much. So do you."

Now she did manage to sit up and turn, and look him in the eye. God he was so _beautiful_ in the moonlight, his eyes and hair shining darkly, she tried not to let it make her voice catch but it was _so_ hard.

"And what about you and Phyllis? What if you match up, new you and old feelings? You don't want it, but she does. _I _could tell even from a few minutes, like you could tell about Ari. The past is a powerful thing Nesmith, are you sure you're up to it?" _I trust you, I do, it's life I don't trust._ His answer startled her, as if he really could read her mind.

"Trust me, Morris, even if you can't trust life. I won't let it take nothin' away from us, and that's a 'careful' promise. Now ditch that sad face and gimme some sugar."

* * *

When Mike dropped Bonnie at the airport the next day he insisted on waiting with her in the First Class lounge. He'd also insisted that she take the new episode outline with her, and made her promise to call Genie to go over costuming and to swap any other ideas they had. "Work calms you down, Morris, we both know the devil makes work for your idle brain."

When her flight was called she wouldn't let him walk her to the gate. "Do you really wanna deal with a fan mob?" When he began to wind up for a trademark Mike Nesmith "Fuck 'em" speech she warned, "There are a whole lot of cameras around and you can only flip off two at a time. Just go out the VIP door the way you came, okay?"

He had to laugh. "Got a point there. C'mere then." He pulled her halfway off her feet for a long goodbye kiss. "I'll call ya."

"Bet you say that to all the girls," she laughed over her shoulder as she ran for the gate.

"Not funny, Morris," he called after her, scowling. "_Not_ _funny_!" But he smiled as he watched her go, and made a mental note to ask Peter about stained glass artists when he called him later.

* * *

"Morris Central," he mused aloud on the drive home. "Gotta nice ring to it." He had the window three-quarters designed in his head by the time he parked the truck, and was all set to sketch it out to show to Pete later. Then…

"God_dammit_, what are you doin' here?"

"Is that any way to say hello after all this time Michael?"

"It is when you keep showing up uninvited. I told you we'd call you."

She stood her ground, saying nothing, and looking every inch the foxy fashion model that first caught him by the hormones a short lifetime ago. She knew it, too, and that pissed him off even more. Unfortunately there was nothing to do but walk past her into the house, and no graceful way to keep her from following.


	6. Remix, His and Hers

_His: L.A._

Mike strode in the door, not slowing down until he got to the dining room, and tossed his keys and wallet on the table. After hearing what Davy and Peter had told him, he wasn't in the mood for an unscheduled visit.

"Are those hers?" Phyllis asked mildly, pointing to the four or five cardboard boxes that were neatly taped up and stacked to one side of the entry hall.

"They're yours. Take 'em with you when you go. I'll be happy to pile 'em in your car, if you tell me where the hell you parked it."

"In the garage." She followed Mike to where he stood near the glass wall. "I'd forgotten how breathtaking the view is from here."

He walked away as soon as she got within a few feet of him. "Well take a picture, because you won't be here long. How the hell did you get in the garage?"

She pulled the remote control from her purse. "With this, you got it installed when we moved in, remember?"

He wheeled on her. "Gimme that." He snatched it from her hand. "This is my place now, I paid a fortune to keep it."

"Yes, you changed the locks…"

"Damn straight. You look disappointed… were you hoping to drop in again when I wasn't here?"

"Of course not… Michael, why are you so _angry?_"

Her look of confusion pissed him off even more. "Hey, it's who I am, it's why you left," he leaned forward and mimicked her, "_remember?_"

"You weren't like this when you called the other day."

"Yeah well that was before you dropped in at the studio, before you tried to play your head games."

Phyllis smiled a little awkwardly. "Can I sit down at least?" Mike nodded tersely and she pulled out one of the dining room chairs and sat, setting her purse on the table. "She told you I was playing 'head games'?"

"'She' has a name, Phyllis, it's Bonnie. And she didn't tell me, Davy did. She wouldn't a' told me anything. She wants to stay outta this, and she's right. Leave Bonnie out of it, Phyl, I'm tellin' you. She's got nothin' to do with this."

"But she does," she told him. "I really had expected to find something different when I came back, not… what I found."

Mike sat down across the table, completely lost. "You didn't expect I might've found someone else by now?"

"I didn't expect you'd find someone, well, someone who wasn't _transient_."

His expression tightened. "That was then, for a whole lotta reasons that'll never make sense. But that's not what I'm after, things are different now. Maybe _I'm_ different now, I'm still figurin' that one out." He wasn't about to pretend that what she described wasn't what he _used_ to be after; they both knew better. "Why don't you just tell me what you're really after, okay? It's not money and I've got the feeling it's not 'peace' either. So why don't we just drop all the groovy-peace talk and cut to the chase."

"You're not making this easy… Michael, you're right. Things _are_ different now, _we're_ different. We've grown up a lot, we have our own lives, we've had the time to see who we are and what we want."

This was getting tiresome. "Yeah, sure, you're right. I'm glad, _really_, that you have a good life now. I'm tryin' to get good at my own."

"Exactly." She looked him squarely in the eye. "Maybe we're both in the right place now, now that all the bad feelings are gone."

"For _what_, for Christsake?"

"To get it right this time."

* * *

_Hers: Midair_

Bonnie had settled in First Class, where she was the only passenger. Before long she discovered she didn't feel like being quite so alone, and the stewardess had been kind enough to direct her to a vacant aisle seat in Coach. Even that had two vacant seats to her left, but at least the whole cabin wasn't empty. She'd been so deep in making notes in the margins of the Fairy Tale plot outline that she'd hardly noticed when the dark haired teenager sat down in the seat across the aisle.

"Excuse me but do you mind if I ask you… is this you?"

The question pulled her from her reading. "Huh? Is who me?"

The girl held out a magazine, folded back to a page full of glossy color photos. "This right here… you look a lot like this picture, and this one. Are you that Monkee lady?" She handed the magazine over, and Bonnie peered closely at the photos. They were, clearly, taken in Paris. She flipped the cover over and saw it was the new issue of Sixteen, the one with Pam Saunders' article. Sure enough, there on the cover over a pic of the boys dashing down a Paris side street was the title: "Ten Days in Paris with The Monkees: An Inside Look At The Hardest Working Heart-Throbs On Television". This one article took up a large part of the issue, and she couldn't help but smile as she re-opened the magazine to one of the several photo spreads. The photo that the girl had been pointing to was the Don Kirshner Champagne Dump at the wrap party. She gave up a wicked snicker, remembering that she'd gotten _two_ shots at dousing him.

"Busted. Though off the clock I'm a little more casual." She indicated her jeans, tie died t-shirt and sandals as contrasted with the fringed and beaded rainbow panné velvet halter-top and bell-bottoms outfit she'd worn that night. And that night her hair had been braided with more beads, hanging down over one shoulder. She really was surprised this kid had recognized her. "Do you mind if I read the article when you're through with it? Bob reviewed it for content but I didn't end up having time to read the final proof before it went to press."

"Well it's pretty cool, I'll tell you that. A whole different side of things. I didn't know a TV show took so much work."

"Honey, neither did _we_," Bonnie laughed. "Hey I'm being rude, and I only do that for money." She stuck her hand out. "Bonnie Morris. And you are?"

The girl shook her hand. "Brenda Damon. Wow. So you work for the Monkees."

"I work for Bob Rafelson," she corrected. "Me _and_ those nut jobs in the matching shirts. We kinda joined up at the same time, so we're more equals than not."

"Doesn't look like it _here_." Brenda indicated a posed shot of Bonnie smacking Micky upside the head, captioned "'Micky Dolenz sometimes requires a firm hand,' says Bob Rafelson's assistant, Bonnie Morris."

"He can get a little rambunctious."

"So what's it like, really?" She was looking a little dreamy, though Bonnie could see she was trying to pull off a casual façade.

"Like babysitting your brothers, mostly. They can be a pain in the butt, but you can't cut 'em loose." She stopped and really looked at Brenda. Yeah, she was a fan all right, but she seemed harmless enough. "And yeah, it can be fun. But mostly it's lots of hard work, like the story says. This here," she indicated the pictures, "they all must've lost ten pounds apiece just running up and down streets, climbing everything they could get a hand and foothold on, and re-taking what didn't come out right the first time. I'm tellin' ya, some guys would've made it a _real_ drag, but we were pretty good at keeping it together."

"So they're all nice guys, like it says here?" Referring to the article, the teenager paraphrased, "Micky's crazy, Peter's soulful, Davy's charming and Mike's moody?"

"That about captures it."

She folded the magazine and handed it to Bonnie. "Here, I can finish it later. I guess it's a waste of time asking for inside stories, huh?" The question was heavy with resignation.

"_Totally_ right on. I'm sure you understand." The title page of the story had an artful scattering of more random images from the shoot. One group candid caught her eye; she and Genie were going over costume notes as Chip and Mike stood by having their own conversation as they waited. It took a closer look, but at the bottom edge of the photo you could see Mike's fingers hooked casually in her back pocket. _Gulp_. Bonnie found herself wishing they'd buried the pic in the middle of the article. Oh what the hell, it wasn't as if he was groping her.

"Yeah," the young girl sighed, "I get it. Can't shoot me for trying. Take as long as you want, I have other stuff to read."

Another few minutes passed, and Bonnie was drawn away from Pam's individual interviews with the guys.

"Nice ring, where did you get it? I have a few of my own." She wiggled her fingers to display them.

Bonnie glanced at her own right hand. On her pinkie was a silver band attached to either side of a circlet of finely twisted gold strands; in the center was set a five-pointed silver star. Nesmith had given it to her before he took her to the airport.

_"It's from Texas, just like me. Think Lone Star if you get to feeling lone-ly," he'd joked. She'd laughed and told him that there was no way that couldn't bring him to mind, because that's what he was: Mike Nesmith, the Lone Star._

"It was a present from a friend."

"Nice you have time to have friends, from that story it sounds like that would be hard. Y'know, all my friends talk about how cool it would be to, you know, have one of the Monkees as a boyfriend. But not me, I don't think I could handle dating somebody that every girl in the world is after, not in real life, because who knows when somebody they like better could come along?"

"Smart girl," Bonnie agreed, looking at her ring. "It's hard to have friends. It's hard to have a _life_."

"Is that why you're going to New York? I'm going to visit my brother."

"Yeah," Bonnie replied in a vague voice before she knew what she was saying, "me too." Suddenly she didn't want to talk anymore to this fresh faced kid who was a little too real for comfort. "Look I'm gonna take a snooze, okay? Thanks for letting me read this." She handed the magazine back to Brenda and pretended to sleep, but her mind was split between what she'd left behind in L.A., and what she'd find in New York. Right now, suspended in midair, neither one felt as sure and certain as she was hoping for.

* * *

_His... and Hers: L.A._

"Get _what_ right?" The look on Phyllis's face made the question unnecessary, but strangely Mike felt his edginess fade, and he felt only disbelief, and not a little pity, on top of a considerable pile of vintage guilt. "Whatever you've been smoking, you need to kick it, and fast. We don't have anything to 'get right', it's not like we had some great thing that we… okay _I…_ screwed up."

"So you're saying we were a bad idea from the start. That we never had a connection that broke, and might be worth reconsidering."

He shook his head as if to clear a hallucination. "Forgettin' for a moment that there is someone else involved here, and you're askin' me to do the same thing to her that I did to you…"

She leaned forward urgently to interrupt, like a lawyer arguing a point. "No, because I know and you know that was _different_. They were strangers, there was no connection…"

_How can she still be missing the point after all this time? _ "Phyllis, be honest. What 'connection' did we ever have that did not include taking our clothes off? What we had wasn't a connection, it was an _attraction_, and there was no 'we', not like you mean. There was you, and me, and all the wrong reasons. We weren't a bad idea, there's no such thing as good ideas or bad ideas. There's just ones that work, and ones that don't. And you and me, we didn't. Look me in the eye and tell me that if you hadn't got pregnant we would've even _thought _of getting married. Hell, we probably wouldn't've lasted another two months."

"Well maybe if I hadn't lost the baby things would've been different."

Saying the words out loud silenced them both, because that was where things had begun to turn from "why not" to "why bother".

When the silence broke, Mike wasn't having it. "You know that's not true. They would've been worse. Two disconnected people tryin' to convince a kid they're a family." The words were cruel, but his voice wasn't. "We got married for the wrong reasons, and we _stayed_ married because we had nothing else to go to. I'm not proud of anything I did, and I'm not proud of how much it hurt you. I'd have done it different then if I knew better, but I didn't and there's no changing that."

Phyllis had gotten up from the table and was staring out onto the valley. "But now you _do_ know better, and so do I. Lately I'm thinking I was stupid to leave, that I should have given it, given _you_ more time."

"Leavin' was the smartest thing you could've done, for both of us. I never knew you, Phyllis, and you never knew me. If we did, we woulda run like hell from each other that second night at the Troubadour, instead of lockin' the door to the instrument room and gettin' it on as if that's all it was about." He got up then and stood next to her, leaning one-handed against the window and looking down at her. "We don't have any good times to get back, and you know it. What we had ranged from so-so to hell, with jive-ass, bummer, drag in between."

Phyllis leaned her forehead against the glass. "I miss it here," she said quietly.

"No you don't. You miss what you wish it was."

Finally she stepped back and looked at him a little quizzically. "So there's nowhere to go from here. We can't be friends, because if what you say is true…" she paused for a second, the quizzical look intensifying, then went on, "and I guess it is… if what you say is true we never were friends either." She walked away to the front hall and bent down to examine the cardboard boxes. No labels.

"Our wedding pictures are in there." It wasn't a question.

_Wedding pictures,_ he thought, _that's a generous word for them. A few black and white Kodak snaps my mom took while she was trying to smile like she meant it. She_ _wanted__ to mean it, can't hold that against her. Your parents didn't come because they hated my guts. Until I made my first hundred grand, anyway, and dressed their baby doll like a queen. Even though I treated her like trash._

"Well I figured you'd decide what you want to do with them." The leftover pain was getting to him now, the unnecessary damage he'd done in response to something that didn't deserve that kind of abuse. Lots of people get married for the wrong reasons and don't make it, but they don't all set a match to it just to watch it burn. Trying to change the subject (somewhat) he pointed to the deck. "If you want your furniture, you can have that too, I just didn't know where to put it 'til then. I can get more."

She straightened up then, so suddenly that Mike almost jumped back. She'd been holding it together pretty well, he figured, but now he could see she was crying. He'd made her cry so many times before, the asshole he'd been back then had always felt a surge of triumph when it happened. The man he was working at being now, who was trying to get beyond asshole, was shamed by it, which took him by surprise because he didn't think he had that in him. _Shame. Didn't have enough of it then, and it's no damn use now._

"We just won't ever get it right, will we?" she asked tearfully.

"Like to think we will," he mused in a gentler voice than he'd planned, "just not with each other."

She was standing close to him, head tipped up, china-blue eyes wide and full of tears; seeing her like that, and knowing why, brought him near to the same place. It may have been the first honest connection they'd made since they met, and the first common thought they'd shared without having to say it out loud: _What a waste_.

Later he wouldn't be able to remember who made the first move, any more than he could explain why the other followed. One thing was sure… he proved his own philosophy wrong. There certainly were such things as bad ideas, and they could grab at you just as hard as the good ones.


	7. Replay I: New York

"Bonnie… sorry, Bonnie? We're approaching JFK."

"Mmf, wha'… we there yet?" Bonnie swam toward wakefulness as the teenager whose name she'd forgotten tapped her shoulder. Mortified that she'd given up her typical on-the-road wake up question, she pulled her seat upright and shook her head. "Uh, right, thanks, mm…"

"Brenda." She didn't seem offended. "You must have some sweet tooth."

"Huh?"

"Well a little while ago you were begging for sugar like your life depended on it!"

Bonnie hoped her face didn't turn as red as it felt. She'd been dreaming of one of those nice sunset make-out sessions wrapped up with Nesmith on the deck glider.

"Oh, yeah, well, it's kind of a weakness of mine," she mumbled.

As they were waiting at the luggage carousel to grab their bags, Brenda held out her Sixteen magazine, wearing a slightly awkward smile. "Would you mind? Signing it, I mean."

Bonnie was taken aback. "Really?" She shrugged, frankly a little embarrassed. "Sure, I guess, but I'm just the hired help."

"C'mon," Brenda urged, and pointed her pen at the Champagne Dump photo, "right by your picture there." She held the magazine steady as Bonnie signed her name.

"Seriously, the only things I usually sign are contracts and memos and office checks! Hey have fun with your brother, I gotta grab a cab."

"You too, have fun with your brother. Nice meeting you." Brenda disappeared in the crowd of travelers. She didn't notice Bonnie cringe at the word "brother".

* * *

Bonnie stood outside the front door of Strings Attached as the cabbie unloaded her suitcase and carry on from the trunk. "Where you want these, lady?"

"Right here's fine. I'll take them in myself. Here, keep it, thanks."

His eyes bugged as he looked at the fifty she handed him. "You sure? I got change, it's the end of my shift." It was just after midnight.

"I'm sure. Don't spend it all in one place," she winked and waved him goodnight. And stood, and stared at the door she'd walked out of over two years ago.

The sign said "closed" but she knew it wouldn't be locked up yet. It never was on a Thursday, not until one o'clock at least, because hoot nights went on as long as the music did. She noticed a small neon sign for Miller beer… that was new, even since Nesmith had been here a few months back; he'd mentioned that Ari had a few brews brought from out back. The permanent "Thursday Night Hoot 7 to ?" sign was mounted in its oak frame to the left of the door. She felt a rush of… something. She didn't know what; right now it was too complex to name. She adjusted her fringed shoulder bag and pulled open the door, bracing it with her foot, then picked up her carry-on and suitcase and ventured inside.

There was a long-haired young guy seated on a bar stool just inside the door. "Buck if you have it, if you don't, don't sweat it. It's almost closing anyway," he told her, eyeing her luggage with curiosity.

She stood there staring at the room, virtually unchanged since she'd seen it last. The tables were still laid out the same, colored glass globes holding flickering candles set at their centers echoed by exotic glass lanterns hanging from the ceiling beams, people of various ages nursing coffee and tea (and beer) and whatever baked stuff was the specialty of the day. There were maybe a little over a dozen people left, mostly at the tables near the stage. A couple more seated at the bar that once served only coffee, which now sported a single beer tap topped with a Miller pull. It even smelled the same… coffee and wood polish and sandalwood and patchouli and whatever other perfumes and incense people brought with them to decorate the air. There was a young girl with long blonde hair seated on a stool onstage, finishing a Joni Mitchell song as she played a generic acoustic guitar, trying her best to sound exactly like Joni and not falling too far short, Bonnie thought.

"Sorry, lady, you lost?" the door guy asked.

Bonnie turned and smiled at him, and confused him completely with her answer. "Not any more. Where can I find Ari?"

"I think he's in the back counting up and boxing the tapes. He expecting you?"

She nodded. "For about two and a half years now." She stopped him as he started to go get his boss. "No, don't get up. I know the way. Okay if I leave my stuff here?" She put down her luggage and shoulder bag.

"Sure, no problem."

Before she went, she held out her hand. "I'm Bonnie Morris, used to come here a lot a few years back."

"Brad Rogers. I think I remember, you used to sit ringside when that outtasight picker played on hoot nights, did a Friday or two, too."

"Yeah, that was Benny… uh, BJ they called him."

"Right… he really could play. Whatever became of him?"

The answer came more easily than she expected. "He died a couple years ago, the van rolled over on the way to a gig in North Carolina."

"Oh wow… what a drag. He was something else."

"Yeah, he sure was. Thanks for watching my stuff." She walked along the back of the room to far side, and paused when she saw someone with a very familiar face pouring coffee behind the bar.

Approaching almost shyly, Bonnie called out, "Hey, Lulu, how you been?"

The petite brunette with short-cropped hair, dressed head to foot in beatnik-black, stopped in mid-pour and almost dropped the coffee pot. As it was, she barely got it down on the bar before her eyes went wide as hubcaps. "Siobhan? Baby, is that _you_?"

Bonnie stepped back and spread her hands. "None other."

With that, the beatnik barmaid climbed up and over the bar and leaped into Bonnie's arms.

"Baby doll, I wondered if I'd ever _see_ you again!" She unwound herself and stepped back. "Look at you, all grown up and slaving for filthy lucre in the big city!"

Bonnie made a face. "Uh, Lu, this _is_ the big city..."

"Details!" She grabbed Bonnie in another wild hug. "What brings you back? Shit, Ari's gonna freak out!"

When they released each other again Bonnie asked, "He didn't tell you I was coming?" Just then a familiar voice grumbled from a doorway at the end of the bar.

"He thought maybe you might change your mind, so better only _his_ heart should be crushed to pieces."

* * *

She walked toward the voice, and lost her own, as the stocky balding man stepped into the light. She'd been afraid of falling apart when she saw him again, but felt calmer than she had in ages.

"_Who_ would do such a terrible thing?" she demanded.

He stood there in front of her, saying nothing for a few seconds. Then he touched her face, ran his hand along her head, like a father would do to a long lost child. "So… you've come crawling back." He spoke the words gently, with a smile, and Bonnie was shamed to see it was his eyes, and not hers, that were filling with tears.

"I'm so sorry," she said quietly before throwing herself into his welcoming hug. "Ari, I'm so sorry I stayed away so long, I'm so sorry I didn't _call_…"

He shushed her even as he pressed kisses on her forehead and cheeks, and fairly squashed the breath out of her. "Such a liar, you called me from Paris, of all places, and what did I tell you then, what?" He held her away from him and scolded, "Cut out the sorry." He wiped his eyes roughly and announced to the curious onlookers, "Allergies, I got allergies. This is Bonnie Morris, who used to hang out here like everyone else. She ran off to Los Angeles to make her fortune," he winked at her, "but I convinced her to come for a visit." He made a show of looking on either side of her, then behind her, then in the pockets of her leather jacket. "So where's that rock star boyfriend of yours? He promised to bring his guitar and show me how it's done."

"Uh, he had some business in L.A.," she told him awkwardly. "He'll be out in a couple of days, he'll call here to tell me when." She was anxious to change the subject. "So, where you living nowadays?"

"Right here!" Ari responded with pride. Bonnie's horrified expression forced him to add, "No, foolish child, not in the club! I bought the building last year, and with some help from everyone you see here," he gestured to the staff busily closing things down, "have converted the floors above to nice walkup apartments, for performers, and staff who need a little place to stay, and of course for me. I have the floor right above," now he pointed to the ceiling, "the whole floor, for my second office and home. Where you and your rock star boyfriend will be staying during your visit. Well he will when he gets here."

Bonnie was frowning. "I wish you'd stop calling him that. He has a name."

"Well then, Miss Picky, tell me. What do you call him?"

"I call him Nesmith. You can call him Mike." She was still on edge not knowing what was happening back home, and she knew Ari could tell. You don't forget how to read a person you know that well, despite her protests to Nesmith to the contrary.

"I'll call him Mike, then. At least you've stopped telling me he isn't your boyfriend." Ari's look of consternation was replaced by an indulgent smile. "Come, we'll leave the rest of this to my experts and I'll take you upstairs. You must be tired."

"Tired? I'm _plotzed_."

Ari's laughter filled the room. "You haven't forgotten the Yiddish I taught you. It warms my heart." He pounded on his chest and faked a dying cough. "Don't be concerned if I don't run up the stairs. I just don't want you to get lost." Brad had just brought her bags to the back door, and Ari picked up the suitcase, handing her the smaller the carry on.

"Whatever you say," she snickered as she followed. Before she could reach the door, though, Lulu launched in out of nowhere and hung round her neck again for just a second before bouncing back onto her feet again.

"You and me, we are gonna make the _scene_ while you're here." Lulu crossed easily between folk, rock, and jazz (not to mention beatnik and hippie) without batting an eye or losing a step. "I'll be in touch." Then she was off again in a flash to finish closing the bar.

* * *

_It feels good to be back_. Nesmith had been right: everything fit just fine. When they got in Ari's front door and put down her stuff, he turned to seize her in another lung-squashing hug.

"I can't tell you how I feel to have you back, even for a few days."

When she stood back and got her breath she admitted, "I'm a little _verklempt_ myself."

He patted her head affectionately. "Don't overdo it darling, it's 1967."

"Okay, Ari…" she laughed and dropped her purse. "It's totally outtasight to be back."

After a brief tour of the neatly furnished apartment and somewhat rumpled "second" office Ari put on water for tea. "Are you hungry? A sandwich maybe?"

"That'll be great. So I get that big spare bedroom all to myself?" It had a gorgeous big brass bed with porcelain accents, a heavy oak bureau and cushy armchairs. Almost everything had to have come from his house in Brooklyn. Everything together made this entirely new place feel like home.

"Until your Mike gets here, anyway."

"He's not 'my' Mike. Here, let me help you with that." She went got up from the kitchen table and took the plate of brisket sandwiches and the pot of tea to set on the table.

"If you don't mind my saying, Los Angeles seems to have made you very picky. No wonder Mr. Mike wants to fly alone." He was joking, but could see he'd hit a nerve. "What is it, Siobhan," he sat down at the table and laid a hand on hers. "It may have been a while, but you know you can tell me anything, just like before."

She took a bite of her sandwich and washed it down with some tea. "I know, I'm sorry to be such a drag. That 'business' I told you about, that he had to get done before he comes? It's to do with his ex wife, she wanted to see him. She said it was about 'making peace' but Nesmith has his doubts and so do I. She even came to my office on some fake reason, and practically broadcast her former territorial rights."

"Oy. And what does he say?"

"He says he doesn't know what she wants, except that it's not money because she has plenty. It's looking more like she wants another crack at him, you know… at them. Which he says is weird, because according to him there was nothing there to want another crack _at_."

"According to him." Ari's doubts, and disappointment in his first impression, were palpable.

"No, not like that, I know what you're thinking. He hasn't been telling me what a mental case she is, or how it was all her fault and now she wants to cash in on his success. It's almost the opposite. He hasn't said a word against her, except wondering what she's up to now. Honestly Ari, if you ever meet a man who takes more blame for screwing up his marriage and treating his wife like shit, tell me and we'll both be surprised." Ari's expression had hardened. "No, no Ari, he never raised a hand to her." After a pause she said in a quiet voice, "He told me he never had to. He's told me so much about the way he was then, about the terrible way he treated her and all the girls…" She trailed off, embarrassed. "You know what I mean, you know this business. Anyway, when I first started at Raybert that's the way he was, their marriage was just about over by then, except for her leaving. It was so early on the job for me it was just stories, I didn't really start working with the guys until about six months later when we were prepping for the first shooting to begin, and even then I mostly worked with production staff and directly with Bob. Once shooting started, though, I worked more closely with the guys. And it wasn't until even later, another couple of months, that Nesmith and I even started talking. We just stumbled into it, y'know? He was so frustrated with finding out how things were gonna be as far as the music, and it frustrated me too that he and Peter, two really good musicians, would be wasted by being forced to fake it." Here she stopped, realizing what she'd just revealed. Ari just smiled gently.

"Don't ever be afraid to say everything you need to say, not here. This room, it's soundproof. And me?"

She stopped him. "You don't have to tell me about you. I trust you with everything I have in me, I always have." She squeezed his hand and continued, "So we'd run into each other, all pissed off about similar things, and would grumble a little. Well he grumbled more, he still does. I'm not crazy about the way it was planned, but I knew that there were more ways out of it than ranting and arguing and driving myself crazy. Nesmith… well, he's getting there, I think, but it's a slow road. It's so hard for him to back away a couple of steps and think it through." She laughed then. "Funny, he always tells me I don't know how to back away from work and take time just for me, or us. And him… he can't back away from anything when he's not on his own, or with me. He gets so _angry_, Ari, at things nobody could make better right away, even though they are getting better in lots of ways, for him and all the guys. It's like he resents his own success and fame and stuff, because it reminds him it's not happening exactly like he planned. But I guess back when he was married, that anger just took over his whole life and he didn't see any point in not acting like an asshole. And he did, my God, if half the things he told me are true... but he _did_ tell me, and he's not living like that anymore, not with me anyway."

"So, maybe meeting you helped it to turn?"

She shook her head. "No, neither one of us thinks that. And neither one of us thinks that he's the reason I stopped trying to back away from the people but hold on hard to the job all the time. It was just, I dunno, the right time for both of us. And it's not him or me, but what's _between_ us, that's what we're into. Neither one of us is magic on our own, believe me. But what came up together… I can't describe it, but it's something I've never had before. And if I believe him, and I do, he hasn't either. So what his ex – Phyllis is her name—what she might want, he doesn't want it at all. He's not proud of how he was, but he's not interested in trying to do it over again."

"You tell me all this, but you seem worried."

"Not worried… okay, yeah maybe. I told him, the past is a powerful thing, and asked him if he was up to dealing with it. He's not just aware of all the damage he did, he's full of guilt over it. No, we never talked about it but you'd have to be stupid not to know. And those two things together, the past and the guilt, and whatever his ex is trying to get... he's young, Ari, you can tell. It's a dangerous mix."

"How long were they married?"

"A little over four years. She left him about two years ago, I think. I barely knew him then."

He blew out a whistle. "He must have been _very_ young when they got married."

"Yeah, he thinks maybe that was part of the problem. He was twenty-one, he said, and she was nineteen. They were both from Texas, both new in the city, they got married for all the wrong reasons, he said. I wasn't there, I don't know all of it. All I know it wasn't good to begin with and he made it worse until finally she left." She sighed, and finished her tea and sandwich. "Anyway, that was then and this is now. And Nesmith said he and Peter both will be getting together with her, because she and Peter got to be friends in the beginning, and I guess that never changed even though they were out of touch. So to keep it all safe and simple, the three of them are gonna do the 'peace making' together, and make sure she knows it won't ever be more than that. Pete's a good enough friend that he can tell her that and she'll have to believe him."

"Well it sounds like for a bad situation you are all doing what you can. And Mike, and your other friends, those famous 'guys' you talk about, they're all as welcome here as you are." He looked at the wall clock. "Siobhan, darling sweetheart, it is almost three o'clock in the morning, and we have an out of town act coming in by noon tomorrow, sound check at two. I've shown you where everything is, make yourself at home. Because from now on, this is. Your home in New York. How does that sound?"

"It sounds like the best offer I had since I signed my contract." She put their dishes in the sink and promised to wash them tomorrow, shushing him when he tried to argue. "I have a call to make, I told Nesmith I'd ring him when I got here. I never understood the 'let me know you got there okay' because if I didn't the cops would be calling, wouldn't they? I'll call him collect."

Ari paused at the kitchen door. "Look, Miss Fancy Pants TV Assistant to the Producer, I own a successful music club. I have bought this place with cash and do not owe a dime to the bank. I can handle a long distance phone call to Los Angeles, thank you very much."

She started to pitch a wisecrack, but stopped. "I love you Ari, you know that? All this time away, I never called, I never wrote… but I never stopped."

He stepped up and kissed her forehead. "I know it, kid. And likewise. Now make your call, I'll see you tomorrow."

* * *

She was smiling as she dialed the phone, eager to tell Nesmith how right he'd been, and not giving a damn that he'd gloat.

_Ring… ring… ring… ring… ring… ring… ring…_

The house wasn't exactly full of telephones, but most places he hung out were within a few steps, especially with that long Texan stride of his. He'd been expecting her call, so he wasn't likely to have his "ears" on in the music room. _Probably at Peter's planning strategy for their 'meeting' with Phyllis, _she thought.

Peter picked up on the second ring. _"Mm, hello?"_ He sounded a little sleepy.

"Hey Pete, it's Bonnie. Did you guys bust out that fancy Indian hookah of yours? You sound kinda stoned."

_"Hey, Bonnie, no, I guess I just fell asleep in front of the TV. How's things in New York?"_

"Great… hey listen, Nesmith expected me to call him when I got in, but he's not answering. I thought maybe he was hanging with you." The two seconds of silence that followed were deafening.

_"Uh, no, Bon, actually Phyl said she was gonna cut her visit short and was going out to Mike's on her own before she drove home."_

He left out the part where he'd lectured Phyllis against her plans at attempted reconciliation, and how he'd advised her to just leave a message for Mike before she left. He also left out his own unsuccessful attempts to reach Mike at the house. The first time was when he was out, bringing Bonnie to the airport. The second time was just a couple of hours ago.

"But I just called the house…"

_"You know how he is. He's probably working on one of his million tunes-in-progress, he never bothers to take the headphones off between replays."_

She knew that he knew better, but why bother to drag on? "Sure, Pete. Well when you see him again tell him I called. He said he was coming out when things got settled. Maybe he's changed his mind."

_"Now hang on a minute hon, you know he hasn't…"_

"'night Pete, sorry to wake you." _At least he didn't call me "babe"._

She hung up the phone. That little sharp-spined frozen ball of glass in her gut that the arrival of Phyllis Nesmith had planted suddenly expanded in a rush, and this time the near-physical pain of it doubled her over.

_Careful, he promised he'd be careful!_

Well he'd promised _'te amo siempre'_, too, and it was looking like he hadn't been much more careful about that either. Bonnie hit the lights and trudged to the bathroom, went through her usual nighttime wash-up-tooth-brush routine. She got changed in her room, too wiped out to bother unpacking anything but her pajamas, and crawled into bed.

Once there, she curled up in a tight ball and cried her way to an exhausted sleep.

* * *

**Today's language is... Yiddish! (don't panic, it's only occasional, and much more fun than French)**

_plotzed: _exhausted, near collapse**  
**

_verklempt: _overcome with emotion**  
**


	8. Replay II: LA

She'd sat down on the (briefly) familiar bed and was slipping off her shoes when something on the bedside table caught her eye, and her breath. A small tin of cocoa butter, the stuff Michael used to smooth his string-calloused fingers in intimate moments, that small considerate gesture that never quite got crushed along with everything else. It was there in its old place, the place it had disappeared from months before she left. She'd always assumed he just took it with him on the road, for use with all the others. She had no way of knowing that by that time he'd completely abandoned it, along with any kind of consideration. She reached for the tin as if she were handling a ghost.

_My God, it's the same one._ _Well I don't suppose that kind of stuff goes stale… maybe just the reasons for keeping it handy_.

She turned the container over in her hand, not opening it, knowing it wasn't here for her. Even _she_ hadn't known until a few hours ago she'd be coming to the house again, instead of meeting with Michael and Peter on some neutral ground. Yet here it was, casually handy, the metal surface slick from recent use. This small considerate gesture, once the last gasp of a rotten relationship. Now marking the progress from getting it all wrong to getting it right.

"_Just not with each other."_

She stood up and looked around the room, realizing it really _didn't_ look familiar to her anymore. Her art work and books were gone, packed up in boxes downstairs and waiting, maybe, to mark her own progress. He was right, this _was_ his place now. And they'd both paid a fortune, in their way, for him to keep it.

_What the hell am I doing here?_

She left the room without looking back, and almost collided with Mike where he stood in the hallway outside the bathroom, looking pretty much exactly like she felt.

_Another first, _she thought, this time with no trace of irrational hope or bitterness.

* * *

He'd been rummaging in the bathroom drawers for rubbers, not having needed them for so long he couldn't even remember where he'd kept them. _Shit, do they go bad after a long time? Christ knows we don't need any holes… not again._

That was the first pause, but it didn't quite clear his head. As he continued searching in the linen closet, the notion of the two Very Different Reasons why he no longer needed rubbers snuck into the back of his mind. The first was, in the infrequent times he spent here in the months before Phyllis left, it was usually her in the bedroom and him on the sofa in the music room. When they _were_ in the same room, any activity requiring rubbers was _not_ on the agenda.

Now the Second Reason stepped up, and that one stopped him cold.

Rubbers were a lost relic here because Morris, with her "magic pills", had made them obsolete. Which reminded him of that night in her hotel room in Chicago, where that last, physical piece of the puzzling connection that had already snared them was prevented by… a lack of rubbers. And how it didn't much matter at the time, because that last physical piece _was_ the last part of the puzzle they were still putting together, and they could get to it later, because so much more was already there. Which, in turn, reminded him of how things went on for days, even weeks, without that last physical piece being an issue or an obligation, until it made its presence felt the first time she'd come here. And even then, he'd thought it would be postponed by… a lack of rubbers. But in the end it was not, because of Morris's magic pills. Which, in the end, dropped the last piece very nearly in place, making the puzzle that much closer to complete. And here he was, one leftover rubber away from scattering the pieces all over the place, just when she was getting comfortable with the first picture he ever really wanted to be part of.

_What the hell am I doing here?_

He left the bathroom without closing the drawers or doors, and almost was run over by Phyllis as she came out of the bedroom, her face looking more like his than any blonde fashion model's had the right to, the evidence of carelessness removed and her mouth tidied up for goodbye.

"If you'll give me a hand with my boxes, I'll be going home now."

* * *

The sun was rising as Mike went back in the house, not having watched her drive away. Once inside, he went straight to the phone and dialed his service. If he knew for sure Morris had called last night when he hadn't, it might help him figure out what to say. But the only message was from Peter.

"_Mr. Tork asks that you call him as soon as possible,"_ Michelle the night operator told him. She sounded a little awkward.

"You sure that's all?"

_"Well Mr. Nesmith, it's a little… well I don't know if I should. Really he meant what I said but he said it, just, ah, in different words."_

"It's okay, sunshine, you're just the messenger. Gimme all of it."

_"The exact message is, 'Call me now, asshole.'"_

In spite of everything, Mike almost laughed. "Well that about says it all. What time did he call?"

_"Just after midnight."_

"Thanks, Michelle. You're doin' a great job, darlin', don't know what I'd to without you."

_"Uhm, thanks Mr. Nesmith, goodbye."_

* * *

Just after midnight… three a.m. in New York. Yeah, that was just about the time he thought he'd heard the phone ring, but he and Phyllis were a little busy at the time, wrestling and swallowing tongue on the enormous cloud-soft sheepskin that Bonnie had bought to celebrate the Emmy nomination, because she knew he liked having soft things next to his skin.

He didn't need one of Morris's crystal balls to figure out what she did next. She'd called Peter to see if he was hanging at his place for the night. And Peter would have called the service, demanding a phone call to explain what new and different way of getting it wrong had just been discovered. There were few things Peter hated more than hypocrisy, especially when practiced by his friends.

It was no secret that Peter knew Phyllis was coming to the house with "getting it right this time" on her mind, because she'd told him when he called her to see when the three of them could get together. Mike knew it because Phyllis had told _him_, she'd _told_ him, _Jesus_, and even _then_ he'd been too stupid to pause for thought, or to wonder how Peter had responded to that. Well, he didn't have to ask, did he? He knew goddamn well what Peter would have said, and in the jumped-up dumbass old-mistakes-new-again heat of the moment, Mike had not wanted to hear it any more than Phyllis had.

As he dialed Peter's number Mike knew pretty much what he'd hear. Morris could take her best shot at him after this, but Pete would get there first. Hard to tell who deserved the honor most.

For the first time in Mike's long experience of fuck ups, he was almost looking forward to the upcoming ass-kicking. It might not be penance, but it could be the closest he'd get to it. Whatever way it went, The Hard Way was getting harder by the minute.


	9. Input

_10:00 am_

Ari was surprised to find Bonnie sitting at the kitchen table drinking coffee. He had things to do in the club office to get ready for the singer who'd be arriving in a couple of hours, a Spanish songwriter and guitarist on a small tour of the East Coast, but the unexpected smell of coffee brewing had drawn him to the kitchen.

"Look at you, early bird. I thought maybe you'd be sleeping later."

She looked up at him, and knew her red eyes would give her away. "Couldn't sleep. Bad news… Nesmith didn't answer last night, because Phyllis was there."

Ari poured himself a cup of coffee and sat down. "And you know this how?"

"Peter, one of the guys, he and Nesmith are kinda tight, and when I called his place to see if Nesmith was there, he told me no, and that Phyllis was going home sooner than planned. But first she was going to see Nesmith at the house. _Their_ house, their former house anyway. They bought it, I mean _he_ bought it, not long before she left. But she went there to see him, and he didn't answer the phone. He was gonna call _me, _Ari, and he didn't answer the phone when I called him. I don't want to know why, but I can guess."

Ari sighed. He didn't know enough about all of the people she was involved with to judge one way or the other. He still had high hopes for this rock star boyfriend of hers; what he'd seen and what she'd told him didn't seem to fit with what she was thinking. But, who knew?

"Will you try to call him again?"

She shook her head, rubbing her now-dry eyes. "I wouldn't know what to say, not yet. 'Hey, how's the wife?' is the only thing that comes to mind, anyway." She dropped her face into her crossed arms, and felt Ari's hand on the back of her head. Nesmith did the same thing, when she was freaked out and upset over something, or nothing. _Calm down,_ he'd tell her. And she always would.

"So, what will you do then? Sitting alone and guessing, it's not such a good idea."

She sat up and told him, "I called Lulu, we're gonna hang out, run around the Village, she said she'll show me what's new since I left." She managed a smile. "Lulu's always a great anti-bummer."

He nodded in agreement. "Good. And you're right, our Lulu leaves no room for bummer." He finished his coffee and rose to go. "The sound check will be early, I'll see you after. Later, call and find out, don't guess. Guessing means _bubkes_." He picked up her hand and kissed it. "And my Siobhan is smarter than that."

When he'd gone she muttered into her coffee, "Don't be so sure. I'm starting to think maybe guessing's all I got."

* * *

_3:30pm_

The taxi dropped Mike off at the club. He'd grabbed the first flight he could get out of L.A., which landed him at JFK about half an hour before. Though music was the last thing on his mind, in addition to his suitcase he'd brought the Gretsch. He'd promised Ari, after all, and figured after everything that had happened, he'd grab for all the good vibrations he could. Pete had insisted on driving him to the airport, after he'd kicked his ass over the phone.

* * *

_This isn't 'now' man, this is 'later'. _

"It's as 'now' as I could get. It's not what you think…"

_Not much. Have you lost it, or what? When did she leave, anyway?_

"About five minutes ago."

_Well congratulations, I really thought you'd run out of new ways to get it wrong._

"Goddammit Pete, will you _listen_? I didn't, I mean _we_ didn't. Okay we started out thinking that we would but we didn't."

_What the hell does that mean? You didn't get it on with Phyllis? You sat and drank beer – oh excuse me Chateau Nerf whatever too high class wine— and discussed world peace?_

"No, we almost made it, but I swear it didn't happen."

_Too bad... did the ringing phone kill the mood? Mike, I don't know what else to say. You finally crawled out of your own primordial ooze and are approaching human-hood, and what do you do? You get with your ex-wife, when the whole reason you're suspecting things might be different was waiting on you. I dunno man, stupid doesn't do it justice. Asshole doesn't even do it justice. This needs a whole new word for fucked-up. Why do you do this shit, after so long? You said you wanted to get it right this time. This is so far from 'right'… it's just the same old 'wrong' in a whole new scene._

"Pete, I'm trying to tell you… I didn't. Not because of some little voice in my head, and not because I got smart at the last minute."

_Yeah, well we know better than that jive, don't we? So why don't you tell me so we'll both know?_

"Because I didn't want to. _We_ didn't want to, not really. I don't even know why we _thought_ we did, maybe all the usual messed up stuff that makes you think if you do one last thing to make up for everything else it'll be right this time? I dunno. Maybe we figured out you can't make up for old damage by doing more. End of story. And I mean the _end_. She's gone, and she won't be back. Neither one of us will be back, not to that."

_Forgive me if that doesn't blow my mind._

"Well maybe it should, because it's blowing mine. Because not too long ago, it all would've ended different, and you know it. Man, you remember how much I cared when Phyllis used to find out about what I'd been up to?"

_Yeah, I remember. You cared not at all. In fact you'd tell her to fuck off and quit complaining, because you came home and you brought the paycheck._

"Right on. And right _now_, all I can think of is how I'm gonna fix this with Bonnie."

_Why, because you trashed the good thing you have, and you're all scared about losing it?_

Silence.

_You there?_

"Yeah. And yeah. For the first time since we got on this fast train to fakesville, I am scared to lose something other than my artistic fucking integrity. You dig? For the first time I trashed something and know I trashed it, and this time I _do_ care, and if you think _you're_ surprised let me tell you... you got nothing on me. And I don't want a medal. I just wanna fix it with Bonnie. Because I like what we have, I like not feeling pissed off and frustrated and all twisted up when I'm with her. I like how she looks at me when I get it right, and I like when I can stop that rattling in her head because she's no good at doing it herself. It's worth more than all I got to fix that. Can you dig?"

_Yeah. Yeah, Mike, I can. You gonna call her?_

"I said I wanna fix it, and a phone call isn't gonna do it. Hell, facing her probably won't do it either, but at least she can't hang up on my face."

_She could punch it out pretty good._

"I guess she's earned the right. Man, I keep sayin' I wanna fix it, but I'm damned if I know how. But staying here doesn't help my chances."

_You book the flight, I'll drive your sorry ass to the airport._

"Does that mean you're through kicking it?"

_Are you high? I haven't even started. Like they say… nobody rides for free. I'll be there in thirty._

"Thanks, man."

_Maybe some day I'll figure out why I put up with all of this._

"Karma, Pete. Before long you'll have more points than Buddha."

* * *

Mike went around to the musician's entrance and found it unlocked, so he stepped in and put down his gear, sliding his shades up on his head as his eyes adjusted to the dimness.

"We're closed, and you're at the wrong door anyway," a girls' voice called out. The owner of the voice appeared, a pretty girl with long red hair, dressed in jeans and a white t-shirt with Strings Attached splashed across the front. When she focused on Mike she pulled up as if she'd hit a brick wall. "Holy shit. I mean, uh, hey, you're Mike Nesmith." She rolled her eyes. "Yeah, groovy, I'm pretty lame, huh? Were you added to the bill tonight? Ari didn't mention it… oh, I'm Annie." She stuck out her hand and Mike shook it.

"Hey, Annie, Mike. No, Ari's not expecting me. Well, yeah, actually," he corrected himself, "he is. He just didn't know it was right now. Look, I don't know where he lives but I need to see him, friend of mine's staying with him, and well… they're both expecting me."

"Well c'mon in, sorry. I'm a little, well, hey I really like your music. All of it, not just the Monkees stuff, the Stone Poneys are burning up the charts with Different Drum," she went on as she led the famous intruder into the main club and bar area, cursing herself for her fan-babble. He followed in silence and set his stuff down again when they stopped next to the bar.

"So, where's Ari live, if you don't mind my askin'?"

Annie pointed over her head. "Upstairs. He owns the building, has a place one flight up, and the other two floors have apartments for musicians and visitors and all that. Works pretty well for everybody."

"Uh-huh." He looked around for a phone. "Think maybe I should call first?"

"Nah, he's cool. Just go on up. You stayin'? I can get you a key to one of the apartments, he's got them in the office." Annie was sorely tempted to offer herself as both native guide and, well, whatever else he wanted. She'd heard about the party tastes of this guy, no matter what kind of friend he was to the woman who was staying at Ari's. But the house rules were written in stone… people who played groupie with an act under Ari's roof would find themselves out of a job, and banned for life. Not that Ari was a prude, he'd been around the music scene long enough to know how things worked in the temporary romance department… but it made business messy. And that was too messy for Ari.

"Not sure yet. But if I could leave my gear down here while I go upstairs?" He tipped a patented Mike Nesmith wink at the girl whose vibe he could feel pouring over him like honey. "If you could look out for my guitar, sunshine, I'd really appreciate it."

"Sure," she promised, but it came out sounding like an extended purr. His eyebrows raised just a little, and she wanted to sink into the floor. "No problem, Mr. Nesmith."

"Mike."

"No problem, Mike. The stairs are over there." She pointed him toward the door past the end of the bar. "Just go on up and knock on the green door. I know he's there, he just finished a sound check and won't be down until close to seven."

"Thanks, darlin'. I'll be back in a few."

_Hopefully in one piece_, he thought, feeling a lot less confident with every step he climbed.

* * *

**_bubkes:_ **nothing


	10. Reverb

If she was there right now, and he had to face her, he'd deal with it as best he could. But Mike was hoping Bonnie wouldn't be there, not yet, so she'd have a chance to read the letter he'd written on the plane, and maybe let it sit for a bit before deciding what to do. If she snapped shut the minute she saw him, Mike knew he probably wouldn't stand a chance this time to persuade her to open up again. He wanted to stand a chance, probably more than anything else he could think of wanting in his life, though he knew the odds against it were long. He added that to the mental list of things that he knew had Changed Since Before, in case Pete didn't cover that one. He knocked on the green door and waited.

* * *

"Come in, already!" Ari hollered from his "other" office. Nobody knew where to find him unless the staff told them, and the staff didn't tell anyone they didn't trust. But the knock came again. "Manners, manners, everybody gotta have manners," he muttered as he went up the hall to open the door. When he saw who was waiting, he understood.

"Well hello again, Mike. I think maybe someone forgot to tell me when you were coming." He stood aside to let his visitor enter, but the tall young Texan only stepped into the doorway after hastily removing the sunglasses he'd apparently forgotten he was wearing.

"Uh, that's okay Mr. Lowenstein. Sorry I didn't call first, I was kind of in a rush."

"No need to peer around," Ari advised as he noticed Mike failing to be subtle, "she isn't here right now. Went out with Lulu, from the club. They have lots of catching up to do. And my name is 'Ari', in case you forgot." He doubted that. His doubts were confirmed when Mike shifted uneasily.

"Well, I thought maybe I'd lost the right, y'know, for that." When Ari took him by the sleeve and pulled him inside, he didn't resist.

"Look, _Mike_, and I am not going to call you anything else, my name is _Ari_. And stop looking like a bandit, I'm inviting you into my home, so you will show me the respect of coming in and calling me by the name I ask. Do you think you can do that, Mr. Rock Star?"

"Yeah, yeah. Sorry, Ari. It's just… well didn't she tell you?"

"She told me, yes. Here, sit." He practically shoved Mike into an upholstered armchair and sat down on another nearby. "She told me lots of things. About herself, about her life since she left here, about how you two tripped over each other and never got up again. So yes, she also told me she couldn't find you when she thought she should. And there ends my interest."

"I don't know what she told you, but I'm really trying to…" Mike began, but stopped when Ari held up a finger and shushed him.

"This is between you and Siobhan. She is like a sometimes-errant daughter to me, but her life is her life. I invited you to visit, and you are here. Anything else is a matter for you two, and not for me."

"I get what you're saying but I just want you to know," he protested, "because I know how close you are. I'm trying my best to do this right, to treat her like she deserves, and I screwed up. I'm _not_ turning back into… never mind. I'm sure she told you about that, too, and it's all true. I don't wanna go back to that. Don't worry, I'm not asking you to tell her anything." He reached into the inside pocket of his denim jacket and handed Ari an envelope. "Here. She'll think clearer if she doesn't have to think with me standing here. Understand? I mean, she's got every right to say anything she wants to me, and decide any way she wants to deal with this. But I figured if she had a little time, maybe…" He trailed off.

"Maybe she won't make a rash decision." It wasn't a question. "Without butting in… do you think I've never sat where you're sitting? Screwing up, _oy_! There are many kinds, big and small." He threw his hands in the air. "My Ruth, sometimes I wonder why she didn't kick me out! But she didn't. So I'll give you this much… I think you're right, and at times Siobhan must be _forced_ to stop and think or sometimes she doesn't think at all. You're looking confused."

"Well, yeah, kind of. You think maybe she won't tell me to go to hell and get lost?"

"A mind reader, I'm not. Tell me, have you ever tried to dance with her? No, I'm not a crazy old man, there's a reason I'm asking."

"Yeah, once. In Paris, I took her out to dinner at a nice place. She didn't want to dance, but I made her do it." At this Ari's eyes widened and Mike acknowledged, "Right on, _that's_ not a victory I expect to repeat. But in the end she was okay with it."

"So, did she step on your feet?" He was relieved to see Mike roll his eyes, and laugh. _Good. He knows I'm not the judge of anybody._

"You could say that. In fact you could say that a _lot_."

"And you didn't send her packing for that, did you? Of course not. Well let me tell you… any two people, their life together is a dance. From what I can tell, you stepped on her feet last night, and pretty hard. But I'm still thinking you want to be the best dancer you can be, for both of you. When you came here a few months ago not knowing what to do but doing it anyway, if you were faking then you wouldn't be sitting here in front of me now, looking like you look. Right now, maybe Siobhan isn't seeing it that way. Right now she just sees your screw-up, not your trying." He gestured with the envelope. "If this comes from your heart, and she thinks, and then listens, maybe she'll see everything she needs to see." Ari glanced at his watch. "And you need to leave now, or Siobhan won't take the chance to think _or_ see when she finds you here."

They went to the door together, and Ari opened it for Mike.

"Thanks, Ari, thanks a lot," Mike shook his hand. "I'm gonna get a hotel room soon as I leave here, I'll call with the number."

Ari snatched back his hand and slammed the door before Mike could leave.

"I invite you into my home, I share my heart and my knowledge, and you repay me with such an insult!" Mike looked so taken aback that Ari dropped his show of outrage. "You'll stay here, my young friend, upstairs." He pointed a finger upward and declared, "_Never_ let it be said that Ari Lowenstein refused hospitality to a man just because he stepped on a lady's feet. Annie will give you a key, ask for number three. Don't worry, I won't tell Siobhan you're here, I'll just give her this," he held up the envelope, "and I'll tell her where to look for you when she has had time to think."

Mike shook Ari's hand again and slapped him on the back for good measure. "You're the best, man!"

Ari gestured dismissively. "You think you're the only person who knows that two mistakes don't cancel each other out? Go downstairs, ask for number three. And while you're down there, check out our stage." He winked and added, "I intend to get you up there before you leave. You should have a little practice first."

"I'll take you up on that. I figure I owe you at least a full set!" His smile disappeared. "Either way." He looked Ari in the eye and saw the older man nod in understanding.

"Something else that Siobhan told me, that you were honest with her about your failings. To be honest with her, you had to be honest with yourself. This I respect, this reassures me that you're the same man who first came here looking for a way to make Siobhan smile again. Nothing she decides will change that. Now go, see how your music sounds in my club."

Ari went back in the apartment and laid the letter on the kitchen table, noticing there was no name written on the envelope. Instead there were the words "_Please read this - Nes"._

On the way down the hall to his office he gestured toward the ceiling and said, "_Yes_, Ruth, don't worry, I'll stay out of it. l'll stay _out_ of it! I'll walk away, I won't even watch to see if she opens it!" Even as he spoke he could hear the words of his dearly beloved late wife echoing in his head:

"And you think you're kidding, _who_?"

* * *

_5pm_

"What can he say that'll make sense to me? Ari, he swore he was just gonna make some peace, him and Peter, they were gonna get together and put it all behind them like grownups, but what did he do? He spent the night with her, at the house! And I'm telling you, they were not divvying up the record albums."

Living up (or down) to his beloved Ruth's expectations, Ari advised Bonnie, "You don't know that."

"Yeah, well you don't know _him_." She tossed the envelope toward Ari where he sat across the table from her.

He didn't pick it up. "Maybe not him, but I know _you_. I know how when you don't want to listen you close up and back away and shut everything out. Like you did when Benjamin died. You closed up, and backed away, and left."

"I'd been planning that for a long time before," she argued.

Ari wasn't buying it. "Sure, planning, you started planning the minute he left for North Carolina. But _leaving_, that was different. You waited here, planning and not leaving, until you knew he was never coming back. _Then_ you left. After you closed up tight, like a turtle. You went to where you thought you'd be able to stay that way. But it looks like someone found a way in, and now you're trying to pull in your head and close up tight again. Well let me remind you, my sweetheart darling, people aren't turtles. When they make mistakes they deserve to be heard before you pull in your head. The young man who flew all the way to my club a few months ago, he told me how you were closed up, not in so many words, but from what else he said, I knew. No matter what he told you he _used_ to be, he was not acting like a man who wanted to stay that way. The young man who came here, then and now, who wrote this," Ari shoved the envelope across the table at her, "he wants something different. Don't make that face at me, young lady. Read."

So she did, reading aloud because she wanted Ari to know she really was reading every word.

* * *

_Bonnie,_

_I'm not just copping out by writing this instead of saying it in person, because it's not fair to expect you to read and think and answer at the same time. We both know that wouldn't go well for either of us. Looking at you, I'd be trying like hell to say the 'right' thing when there's no right thing to say. And you'd go right into the armadillo roll, and that would be that._

_You were right, the past is a powerful thing. I wasn't careful enough, or else I wasn't smart enough to know that being careful isn't enough. Turns out you can make old mistakes for new reasons and I won't lie, I came damn close. I can tell you as much as you want to know, later, about what happened and didn't, but I know that's not the biggest thing on your mind. Who I really am, that's what you're thinking about, who I am and how much of it is the same as who I was, and can I be different no matter how much I want to. I won't try to answer that here, because even if I never lied to you about what I've done before, what reason do you have to believe what I'm saying now?_

_I can say I'm sorry, I can say 'te amo siempre'. That's not enough to keep you with me even if you believe it. But before you make up your mind, talk to Peter. Ask him what's different this time than before, he's been here all along and has seen everything. He'll know what it means when you ask him and he'll tell it like it is and if you don't believe anything else, believe he will not lie to save my ass. Maybe then you can find a reason not to walk away._

_So even though I have no right to ask, please try not to roll up tight and walk away for good. If you give me a chance to fix what I broke, I swear to God I will find a way to deserve it. _

_Michael_

* * *

She laid the note on the table. "How did he look?"

"'How did he look', Miss Turtle asks?" Ari blew out a sharp breath. "Like he knows what he did, and he wants to do better. So now, it's up to you. Be a human being, or be a turtle."

"Not a turtle," she answered quietly, "an armadillo." Ari waited, eyebrows raised, so she explained, "He calls me 'armadillo', sometimes, like he says here. Says I roll up in an armor shell when I get mad or scared, like you said. Won't talk, won't listen. Like that first time he came out here." She didn't tell him about the nights when Nesmith had to coax her out of her shell even while she was asleep.

"So, _he_ knows you too. You're not as big a secret as you think, not to the people that love you."

"Whose side are you _on_ anyway?!" She shook her head and pointed at the letter before declaring, "If he _loved_ me, this wouldn't have happened. If he _really_ loved me, he wouldn't have had to _write_ this."

Like a parent who decides he's been patient for too long, Ari stood over her and spoke in a stern voice.

"Siobhan Maureen Morris. You know I love you, and I loved Benjamin, both of you like my own, like the children my Ruth and I were never blessed with. She would have loved both of you too, if she'd still been alive to meet you. And she'd tell you what I will tell you now: _grow up_. You are almost thirty-five years old and you know life is not a fairy tale, so stop talking like fairy tales. Human beings aren't perfect. And take it from one who was married for thirty years, _love_ isn't perfect. If Mr. Mike Nesmith didn't love you," Ari paused to pound the note several times with a stout forefinger, "he wouldn't have bothered to write this. He wouldn't have _come_, not now and not the first time. Will it kill anything but your pride to call your friend Peter? What you told me about, what you and Mike have, even if it came to you by accident, that's not something to throw away without even listening."

She was surprised by Ari's insistence. "Okay…" Then she changed her mind. "No. No I'm _not_ gonna put Peter in the middle of this. If Nesmith wants me to know what's 'different' he can damn well tell me himself."

"Aha. It seems you're a little different now, too. You want to listen, and not shut up like a turtle."

"Armadillo," she sighed, giving up the battle against hurt and anger, and not a little fear. "And okay, this time I'll listen even though I'm scared to. If he can come out here and face me, I can listen."

"What scares you so much?" he wanted to know.

"What scares me is I _love_ him!" she burst out, and continued in a rush of words, "What scares me is he's twenty-seven years old and I'm close to thirty-five, that he's just beginning to try to act like a decent human being for the first time in years, he tells me that over and over, but he's angry at the _world_ most of the time and the rest of the time he's trying so hard to make everything right for me… I swear he just _astonishes_ me sometimes, how he knows me and what he does for me just because he knows I need it or want it, but Jesus he's a _rock star_, Ari, and it's no joke, he's famous and everyone's watching him and wanting a piece of him, and every girl's wanting '_that'_ piece of him and God knows he was always willing to get it on with them, he told me that himself." She looked at him as if pleading for him to make sense of it. "I don't get it, I feel _right _finally, with Nesmith I feel like myself for the first time since I lost Benny, but I'm balanced on this tightrope with him and he's juggling what he was and who he's trying to be. And man, the whole world is shaking both ends of the wire. It _all_ scares me."

"Sweetheart. Love is _supposed_ to scare you. You think nobody else is scared? You think my Ruth and I, we weren't scared? Scared of falling in love, scared of not being worthy, scared of being wrong? Scared that the 'worse' part of better or worse, we couldn't survive? Scared of losing each other?" He leaned down then and kissed the top of her head, speaking more quietly than before. "If love _doesn't_ scare you, you're not paying attention. Don't lose it when you don't have to. Listen to Mike, then talk, both of you. A mind reader, I'm not, and a psychiatrist, even less. But sweetheart, darling… if that young man doesn't love you then I've never been right in my life about anything. And scared? I saw it in his eyes, he's shaking in his heart, but he came here anyway."

"Where'd he say he's staying?"

Ari snorted. "At a _hotel_, he said. The gall. I told him no, I sent him down to the club to get the key to number three. I'm not such a judge of men's mistakes that I would send him away to a hotel." He patted Bonnie's hand. "He said he was going to see how his guitar sounded on the stage. He's probably still there, it hasn't been long. Nobody will be coming back for oh, an hour or more. Go." He shooed her to the door. "Go be human beings. 'Perfect' is not required."

* * *

By the time she'd gotten down the stairs and to the door at the end of the bar, Bonnie still didn't have any idea what she'd say. Hell, she didn't even know what she was _feeling_, except confused and hurt and yeah, scared. In spite of all that she also felt tempted to ignore it all if he'd just give her that smile that reached his eyes, and tell her in that honeyed drawl that it was all gonna be just fine. She'd _have_ to believe him if he did that, wouldn't she? She always did before.

Just as she got to the door she could hear it, a cascading guitar riff, the tune sounding distantly familiar. As she entered she realized it was the tune he'd been humming in her ear, that night on the deck when he'd told her how great her trip would be. How everything was gonna be _just fine_, just before he'd teased her about her French-accented Spanish. That night when he was doing all the little things he did that always made her feel warm and right, lots of little things that crowded out the big things she couldn't control. The cold, sharp ball of glass in her gut disappeared the moment she saw him, that emotional parasite that had arrived along with Phyllis Nesmith. It was replaced by a flicker of longing, fanned by a familiar rush of butterflies.

He was standing on the small stage at the far end of the room, turned three-quarters toward the back wall, focused on his music. One eye on the controls, as always, looking for that perfect sound. From across the room he still looked impossibly tall, even with head bent and one leg shot out to the side as he maneuvered up and down, as if gravity itself would help him find that elusive groove he was always reaching for when he played. He was wearing his signature slim blue jeans, the hated wide "hipster" belt replaced by narrow black leather with silver conchos, and that pale denim shirt with the cuffs rolled back exposing strong wrists and agile hands. Cowboy boots this time, making his long legs look even longer. She could see he hadn't shaved in awhile, and knew that when she got closer she'd notice that the careless beard would be bringing out his dark eyes and making him look younger and softer to her than the face he usually showed the world.

Bonnie was about ten feet from the stage when Mike turned his head halfway to look at her, an uncertain gaze from around the edge of that smooth dark wave of hair. It took everything she had in her not to race the rest of the way to him, to throw them off balance and bury herself in him, surrounded by Ivory Soap and long strong arms and promises in Spanish that he was trying so hard to keep.


	11. Resonance

"I wasn't sure you'd wanna find me." Mike spoke quietly and moved slowly to put the Gretsch in its stand and turn off the amps, as if a sudden move or too loud a word would send her running away. He moved just as slowly to sit on the edge of the stage, boots barely touching the floor.

"Neither was I."

Bonnie ventured as near as she dared, stopping about six feet distant. She was afraid of what she'd do if she got within reach, his or her own. Standing here just out of reach, seeing the sad, guilty way he looked at her, she could understand what Ari said. _He looks like he knows what he's done and he wants to do better. _But she could see something else, too… that he was thinking he might not get the chance. To her surprise, as she looked at Nesmith looking at her, she also understood how two people could almost convince themselves to forget every bad thing that had ever happened and be tempted to give in to the notion that nothing bad had ever happened at all. _Just touch me, let me kiss you and hang on for dear life, and everything will be okay. _But it wasn't that easy. She didn't feel as bleak and final as his eyes told her he felt, but still it just wasn't that easy. The silence lasted so long, and his eyes on her were so steady and waiting, that she shoved her hands in her pockets and shifted a little from one foot to the other to show she was waiting, too.

"Do you want to talk, or listen?" he asked.

"I don't care which. But I promise, no armadillo."

A smile pulled at his mouth. "Good. Did you call Peter?"

"No. It's not fair to put him in the middle of this."

He shrugged in apparent defeat. "Well then I guess I know what comes next, because I don't know what to do that'd make a difference."

He reached for the shades perched on his head but Bonnie was faster, jumping up and grabbing them and slamming them to the floor before stomping on them for good measure, then moving back again. "You can _start_ by not hiding behind those fucking shades!"

Mike looked down in consternation at the wreckage of his two hundred dollar Ray Bans, and then looked at Bonnie. "I was gonna put 'em in my pocket, actually."

Bonnie spun in frustration, gesturing wildly. "I'm sorry, okay? But you _know_ you do that, you use them as a signal that you're ready to talk, or you're through dealing with things. And since you've made it obvious you assume I won't believe anything you say, what else could I think?"

Shades forgotten, he was a picture of disbelief. "You mean you won't just think I'm jiving to save my ass?"

She'd advanced a couple of paces before she caught herself, and stopped.

"Are you _high_? All the nasty things you've told me about yourself, everything you did, all the kinds of asshole you were, why would I think you'd pick _now_ to start lying? You have no good reputation to _save_, remember?" She calmed down some and realized she was almost within reach, but couldn't manage to step back. "I meant what I said about Peter, but it's more than just not wanting to put a weight on him. I love Peter, I do, and he's a good friend to me, but he's been more than that to you. He's your witness and your confessor and your ass-kicking anti-Buddha guru from hell. Neither one of you had to tell me that, it's written all over both of you whenever you're in the same room. Everybody needs someone like that, and Pete's yours. It's not right to make him interpret you for me. It doesn't matter if you want him to, it just doesn't feel right to split him like that. Yeah, it sounds freaky, I can't explain it."

"You just did. It makes sense, you putting it that way. But I gotta wonder who do _you_ have for that? Ari? You haven't seen him in years. Genie, maybe someday, but not yet, I can tell."

"Don't you know?" Bonnie looked at the floor, afraid to meet his eyes. "It's been _you_, ever since I got to L.A. That's why this is _killing_ me. Something like this mess, what happened or didn't happen with Phyllis, a person would go to her best friend and lay the cards out however they fell, and get them read to her just as they are." She raised her eyes to Nesmith's again, willing them to stay dry. "But that's always been _you_, get it?"

"Aw Morris…" he held a hand out to her, but she stayed just out of reach.

"Besides, I need to hear what's changed, that's what you said, and you were exactly right. But I need to hear it from _you_, and I need to be looking at you because I'll know where it's coming from then, and because you've never lied to me even about the worst stuff so you won't lie to me about this. But I do need to know, or I don't know where to _go_ from here."

"What's different is that I didn't used to give a goddamn about what I did and who it hurt. Whenever I got busted for all my screwing around it just pissed me off, and I'd tell her to shut up and buy something for herself with the money I was bringing in. When some chick I'd screwed on the road wrote me some sad little love letter, I threw it out. None of it mattered. Damned if I know what _did _matter to me then, because once I figured out I wasn't getting what I wanted in the contract, partying and paychecks and grabbing easy ass was good enough for me. I don't know why, I really don't, I'm no shrink. All I know is that now I _do_ give a goddamn. And you haven't asked about what happened last night but I'll tell you anyway, some stupid part of Phyllis and me decided that we could make up for a shitty past by getting into the only thing we ever were good at. But it didn't get too far before both of us had the same brain hit… _what the fuck is going on here?_ Why did we think something that led to so much _shit_ could possibly make up for it, especially when I'd be doing to you what I did to her, without even a lame excuse to back it up? So she just asked me to help her put her stuff in the car, and she left. Just like that, like some freaked out acid flashback. Bright, and ugly, and gone in a couple of hours as quick as it came, and leaving me giving the biggest goddamn of my lame-ass sordid life. _That_ is the difference, Morris. Before, whether I drove someone away or not didn't even register. Now it's _all _that registers. And since I wanna continue the tradition of not lying to you, I'll tell you straight that it surprises the holy hell outta me. I did not think I had it in me." He paused, then invited, "Okay, your turn." He looked painfully resigned to whatever she'd say.

By now Bonnie was leaning back against a table just a couple of feet from the stage. She hadn't expected to hear this, she'd expected to hear a sincere apology and an equally sincere account of the better man he was trying to be, an acknowledgment he'd fucked up badly, but would try harder not to. And all of that was embedded in what he'd actually told her, she supposed, but what he'd said meant so much more.

"My turn, yeah…" she looked at the floor again and then back into his eyes, because he'd had the guts to look her in the eyes and tell her everything. "I'll tell you what's different now, too. When I really, really had to think about how to deal with this, the armadillo in me rolled up but this time it died. Nothing to hide behind this time, even if I pretended there was. _That _surprised the holy hell outta _me_. So I started thinking, how did that happen, can't I just blow it off and shut you down like I did before, because this time there's a real reason to?" She took a breath. "After Chicago, when I said we were done, before we even got started… you proved me wrong. In Paris, when I figured it was just another city and another job, and nothing that could happen could push me all the way over the edge to fall for you and really _feel_ what you were doing was for me and for us, you proved me wrong again." She was trying hard to gather her thoughts so they made sense, even though nothing felt like it made sense except to be with him. "I met this girl on the flight here, a fan, she had a copy of the Sixteen that Pam did the Paris article for. And she said something about how her friends all say how great it would be to date a Monkee, have a boyfriend who was one of you guys, but she said nope, not her. That she couldn't handle dating someone that every girl in the world wanted, and anyway what would happen if he found someone he liked better? And she said how hard it must be to have friends in this job we do." She fingered the Lone Star ring on her right hand as she spoke. "I told her she was right. So I've been thinking, that this is hard and it's messy and it's never gonna be perfect, but what if I walk away this time, and I'm wrong again? I'd never know, because you wouldn't be around to _prove_ it."

She ran out of words, and it was getting harder to keep her eyes dry. She could see Nesmith's expression change to the one he wore when all he seemed to want to do was make things okay.

"Tell me what you want me to do," he said plainly. "Whatever it is, I'll do it." His hands were turned palm-up, beckoning a response. Beckoning _her_.

She went to him then, standing between his knees. She touched his face with unsteady fingers, little tracings in his beard as she cocked her head to one side and looked thoughtful. She could feel his hands on her, not pushing or pulling, just resting on her waist, a little bit of balance with no demands.

"Prove me wrong, okay?" she pleaded. "I'm afraid we won't be able to do this right in the real world, that we're not gonna be any better at it than you were before at being faithful, or I was at not slamming shut at the first bad thing. No matter how hard we try." She looked in his eyes, still holding and touching his face. "Everything feels right for me when we're together, I don't wanna mess it up, I don't _wanna_ fight with you or be pissed off or walk away, I just wanna be _wrong_ again. I wanna wake up tomorrow next to you and we'll ask each other how could we have been so _stupid_ about this?"

She was too close for him to see her face clearly, but Mike could feel the wetness in his beard where she rubbed her cheek against his; now she was pressed against his neck and shoulder and he could feel her breathing deeply and could guess why.

"Bonnie, baby, don't cry, please…" he murmured, "relax, it's gonna be okay, we're gonna be okay. You'll know you're wrong, real soon, you'll know." He lifted her face and rested his forehead against hers. "There's nobody I'm gonna like better, I don't care how many girls there've been or how many are out there, if you believe everything else believe that too."

"Good, good," she half-whispered, half-cried, "I wanna be wrong." It was starting to feel like a mantra.

"You're wrong, I promise," he told her, then kissed her very softly, then pulled back and repeated "wrong." He kissed her again, and again, punctuated each time with a promise of "wrong", until finally he whispered it in Spanish, "_errada",_ the word fading into her mouth in a soft buzz of trilled r's as she wrapped her arms tight around his neck and he reached around her waist to pull her in hard and rock her slowly with him.

* * *

Lulu had come in some time before and was setting up the bar as unobtrusively as possible, not that she had to worry much about being noticed. Though nothing was said about it during the day, Lulu could tell Bonnie was wrestling with something formidable. She glanced up from her coffee inventory every couple of minutes to gauge the progress her old friend's rapprochement with her new (and problematic) lover.

* * *

_He's talking, she's six feet away._

_She's talking, and moving closer._

_Smashed shades, spin and rant._

_Talk and listen, talk and listen._

_A look you don't need words to translate._

_One sentence from him, and she's all the way there._

_Her hands on his face, his hands on her waist._

_Whispers. Tears._

_Kisses._

_Bummer re-routed to groovy._

* * *

Lulu smiled and went into the office to count-in her cash drawer. It was going to be a good night after all.


	12. New tracks

Finally breaking from their tightly-bound embrace and string of kisses Mike suggested to Bonnie, "C'mon, let's go upstairs, it's been a long damn night for both of us." As she waited for him to pack up his Gretsch, the places where he was no longer touching her actually seemed to hurt. He reached for her with his free hand as soon as he hopped off the stage and she didn't let go until they reached the door marked "#3".

It was smaller than Ari's place, but furnished in similar style, with some extra touches like framed album covers on the walls and brightly colored prints of concert posters. All the stuff that would welcome visiting musicians weary from the road and tired of hotels. Overstuffed armchairs and an equally overstuffed matching sofa dominated the small living room, whose opposite wall was lined with a bookshelf and a small stereo and shelf of records from every musical genre from klezmer to classical. The kitchen was fully supplied with cookware and dishes but not much else, as there hadn't been the usual advance warning of incoming guests for #3.

He caught her glancing at the counters and cabinets and reassured her, "Don't panic, Morris, there's real coffee, I saw it in the cabinet right next to the percolator."

She would have laughed, but when she turned toward him something inside of her tripped her up. He looked so casually _perfect_; fitting a space she now knew was shaped exactly like him, and had been waiting for him for years. Michael Nesmith was a dark perplexing mix of soft and hard, sweet and bitter. And seeing him as he was right now, bloodshot and wrung out, reaching for normal because they both wanted it so desperately, she knew having him in her life just like this was the most perfectly right thing she'd ever felt.

"What?" he asked as she stared at him. He had no strength left for guessing games.

"_Michael_." She said it as if seeing him for the first time, and threw herself into his arms the way she'd wanted to so badly when she'd first walked in on him downstairs. Feeling him grab on and hold her made it easier to breathe.

He staggered back a step and regained their balance, lifting her off her feet just a little. "Hey now," was all he said.

But when she looked up at him he smiled, the one that melted her every time, and told her, "Still wrong." Instead of kissing her he hugged her head to his shoulder for a few seconds then reared back and said, "Lookin' mighty serious there, Morris, I wish you'd give up a smile." She offered what she thought was a good one, but he shook his head and sighed. "You'd never make it on TV, you just _cannot_ smile on cue." Then he did kiss her, and when he put her down again she was smiling for real. "That's better. But it's a little more work than I'm used to."

It felt a little confusing to be falling back into their light give-and-take; he could see the uncertainty as her smile faltered.

"Look, now you tell me if you think I'm wrong, but _I'm_ thinkin' the only way for us to get back into normal is to _act_ normal."

"Not to act like nothing happened?"

"_Hell_ no. Plenty happened, to both of us. I am _not_ tryin' to pretend it didn't. I know I broke something, and I know I want to put it right again. But the only way I know how is to be the me that I can only be with you." He thought about that for a minute. "That hardly sounds like English." He rubbed a weary hand over his face and groaned, "God_damn_, Morris, I can't make sense when I haven't slept in days."

"It's okay, I get it." Then _she _paused and thought about it. "That would be scary if it didn't feel so, uh, _normal_. I haven't slept in days either, where's the bed in this joint?"

He pointed down the hall. "Not as big as we're used to, but it's _stately_."

Bonnie took his hand and pulled him after her and when she saw the bed she had to agree… it was a candlestick four-poster, no canopy, the posts and headboard carved from what looked like rock maple, covered with a beautiful flowered bedspread and matching pillow shams and dust ruffle. Stately.

"Wow. Ari sure does mix up the décor, huh?" She continued to tug him along, wanting nothing more than to lie down with him and sleep to the sound of his heartbeat. She felt him hesitate. "What?"

"I don't know what you got in mind, but right now I couldn't get it up with a forklift."

She yawned and patted his (_perfect_) butt. "That's not what I want right now anyway." She pulled him closer and wrapped her arms around his waist, smiling against his shoulder when those long arms wrapped around her in return. "_This_ is what I want right now. Just you and a good long nap. We can buy a forklift later." She could feel his blessedly familiar smirk against her neck.

"I didn't say it was a _permanent_ condition, Morris." He stepped back to pull off his boots, shirt, and belt, then stretched out on the bed and raised a hand to her. "Well c'mon, I need somethin' soft next to me and I'd say you're it."

Bonnie pulled her shirttails out and kicked off her shoes, then sat down on the bed and looked at him lying there in just his t-shirt and jeans, waiting for her.

"Know what this reminds me of?" she asked, then answered her own question. "Chicago."

He slipped a hand under her shirt to reach around her waist and pull her down to him. "Nah, not Chicago, back then we were just stumblin' in the dark. Not anymore." When he had her well-tucked in his arms he confessed in a low whisper "But I sure was scared I broke everything to pieces." He hugged her even closer, as if checking for damage.

"Me too. But I think you just bent it a little." The warmth of his fingers stroking tiny circles on her skin felt so right she almost wanted to cry. When she turned her face up to look in his eyes, they were already closed. _My good God, he is beautiful,_ she thought (for probably the millionth time since she'd met him) and nuzzled a kiss into his beard.

"I'm still part armadillo," she mused quietly, "but I'm learning when to unroll."

"Mmmamadillo," he mumbled and turned quickly enough to catch her mouth in one of his ambush-kisses. "Gotcha."

* * *

Mike woke after a couple of hours. Bonnie still slept soundly, rolled partway out of his arms but not curled up in her customary tight, distant ball. She was even sort-of facing him, face buried in the pillow, snoring gently.

"Makin' progress, Mamadillo," he observed with a smile. He was feeling rested now, the tension and worry of recent days gone as if by magic. Well, not quite magic. Careful not to wake her, he got up and slipped on his shirt, deciding now was a good time to finish that song he'd been working on. He'd been thinking of the best time to premiere it, and the answer had come to him since arriving in New York. He turned and looked down at where Bonnie lay, her hair tossed around her and one hand resting on the warm space he'd left behind. He shook his head in consternation.

"I must've been plain crazy," he whispered to himself. He tucked the bedspread around her and bent to kiss her head before leaving the room.

* * *

Some time later Bonnie woke up, confused to find herself alone. _But I thought he was, I thought we were… _ She rolled over in a panic. _It was a __dream__, he wasn't home last night when I called… it's all coming apart._

Then the fog burned off. _Wait, this bed is different._ She forced her eyes to focus, and saw his boots by the bedroom door. And smelled the ghost of Ivory Soap on the pillow next to her. _Okay, it's okay… we're gonna be okay._ She got up, still a little shaky, and as she padded down the hall heard that cascading riff again. It sounded like water rolling over and over itself, musical water cascading from steel strings. He was singing, but she could only sort out a few of the lyrics: "known you for a long time", "standing too near". The rest were spoken in that low contemplative voice he used when working on a song. It always sounded to her like some mysterious negotiation between man and instrument, but the only time she'd suggested that he'd laughed it off and told her, "The day my guitar talks back I am _done_ with this gig."

He must have heard her coming down the hall just now, because the music and muttering stopped.

"Hey, whazzat?" she asked, voice still fuzzy from sleep. "I heard that before. You were humming it one night at your place."

He managed to slide the charts into the Gretsch case without looking hasty. "Just somethin' new. Not ready for the public."

She sat down on the sofa next to him, trying to peer into the case before he laid the guitar inside. No dice; he was way too smooth. "I'm not the public, in case you forgot."

"And you're not the songwriter either, in case you forgot," he shot back. "I'm still workin' on it. You'll hear it when it's ready. And you stick that lip out like that, I'm gonna have to do somethin' about it," he added as she sat back wearing an exaggerated pout. When she stuck her tongue out he pulled her closer to him. "Even better," he growled as he opened his mouth to hers.

Neither one of them noticed the phone until the third ring.

* * *

_A short while earlier_

As Peter, Micky and Davy headed toward Bob's office they were surprised to see Don Kirshner coming – no, _marching _– toward them, bundles of files and briefcase in hand.

"Hey, Don, taking work home for a change?" Micky asked him, all faux innocence. One of their major gripes about Kirshner was that he only worked for _them_ when he was in the office… his out-of-office time was spent schmoozing and working connections for himself, "hit factory" wise. He spent at least as much time looking for new acts as he did supposedly "making them stars" by shoving other people in the studio instead of them. Mike had once observed that Bob could make a fortune charging Don for studio time for the acts he was trying to build off the Monkees.

"Fuck you. Fuck _all_ of you. You think you're gonna make your own album? And it'll _sell_? You're all smokin' _way _too much." He didn't even slow down as he spoke, his words trailing over his shoulder as he pounded toward the exit.

"_Always_ a delight," Davy called after him.

They'd come to the studio because, much as it killed them to admit it… they were _bored._ After just a few days with nothing to do, the rest of the two weeks stretched out in front of them like a desert. It was probably the first time since the whole wild ride started that there were no tapings, no script meetings, no vocal tracks to lay down, no gigs to rehearse for or perform. In the past five days they had discovered a territory they'd never suspected existed… the farthest reaches of amusement that good smoke, great parties, dancing, and willing women could provide. It was as surprising as it was embarrassing.

Lazing around Pete's pad the day before, they'd finally admitted it to themselves. Peter had tried to make it sound very music-smart and practical.

"Look, guys, how about we just go and work out some riffs while it's fresh in our heads? We've all been working on it in our heads and between us since Paris, so even just the three of us can see what works so far."

The other two knew better, and Micky didn't mind saying it out loud.

"You mean let's find something else to do before we lose our minds, don't you? I don't know about you guys but I'm ready to cut my own throat just to prove I got some life left in me to lose, and the 'cute one' here," he jerked a thumb toward Davy, "he's run out of girls who haven't heard his opening line. Besides," now he gestured sadly to the empty hookah in the corner, "we're outta grass, and your buddy Ray is outta _town_ for another four days. So if I gotta keep looking at you guys without a script, a set list, or a buzz on, I'd rather have it happen in rehearsal where something good might come of it. Dig?"

They dug, and agreed to go to Bob's office the next day (where they knew he would be, because obsession never sleeps) and get the key to recording studio so they could work on the sound and hear the playback. Mike was the only one with a good enough recording space to even try it on their own, and he was…

"Laying around with the boss's secretary," Micky laughed then hastily added, "and if you tell Bonnie I called her a secretary I will swear on a _stack_ that you're goddamn liars."

While none of them actually begrudged Mike and Bonnie some time off together, an opportunity to rag on Mike even in his absence was not to be ignored. Meanwhile Peter kept his thoughts, and his knowledge, to himself.

So now they jogged toward Bob's office full of glee over Kirshner's mood and wondering what had triggered it this time. As usual, they trooped into Bob's office without knocking.

"Hey guys, I was just gonna call you." A suspicious look replaced the initial smile. "What are you doing here? You're on vacation, remember? What you always whine you don't get, what you beg for, what you will _die_ without, remember?" He was only half kidding.

They slouched in various chairs before answering.

"We want some studio time, got some ideas to work on," Davy explained. "Toss us the key and we'll be out of what's left of your hair."

"Ha ha. Sure, in a minute. Look I'm glad you're here… I need to get hold of Bonnie. Where can I reach her?" He was answered by gales of laughter.

"You must be _in_-sane," Micky told him. "Even if we knew, if we told you where she's staying we'd be singing soprano once she got back, remember?"

The Boss was not amused. "Look. I _know_ one of you knows how to reach her, or at least where to find Mike. I don't care where she's staying, I just need to _talk_ to her for five minutes."

Davy and Micky exchanged blank looks and shrugs and then both turned to look at Peter. Ironically, Peter was unsuccessful at playing dumb.

"Honest, I don't know where they _are_. I only know they'll be visiting a club in the Village where Bonnie used to hang out. I don't even have the number."

"But I bet you have the name. It was their second home, her and her brother. Don't look so shocked, will you, she has given me a few more details about herself. Of her own free will."

"Except for the name of the place," Micky said. "If she wanted you to know she woulda told you."

Bob slapped his desk in exasperation. "It may take all three of you to annoy me as much as Nesmith, but you're doing a real good job right now. I just need to tell her something before it hits the papers, or she'll be buried in press calls and God knows she does _not_ like surprises any more than I do."

"Maybe if you tell us what's gonna hit the papers," Micky suggested slyly, "we could give it some thought. Maybe have a _meeting_." He cracked up, but Davy and Peter weren't laughing. They were staring at Bob, waiting.

"Well you're gonna hear it anyway. Kirshner's through. I just told him we're not renewing his contract. Don't look so fucking smug, it's just good business. You're getting lots more attention now, with the live tours and the gold record even if you only did the vocals. _Especially_ since you only did the vocals. The second album's burning up the charts even though you hate it, and the rumbles are starting about who's playing what. It's time to cut the 'hit factory' loose or we're gonna be stuck explaining why you're not on the assembly line, you dig? You wanted to do it yourselves, well now's the time. I've made Chip music director for the show and for your recordings. Mike's already had a crack at producing, no reason not to let him do it again. Session musicians will be used as needed, but credited as session musicians." His three visitors sat with mouths agape. "Congratulations, inmates," he tossed the studio key in the air, and Peter caught it neatly in one hand. "You are now running the asylum. The musical one, anyway. _I'm_ still in charge of the show. Now _where_ is that place Bonnie is visiting? I know she can think on her feet if she has to, but I _don't_ want Nesmith running off at the mouth without a script."

Now Bob, Davy, and Micky were all staring at Peter.

"Okay, okay! Strings Attached, it's in the Village. The owner is a guy named Ari Lowenstein."

Bob was dialing Information just after the last syllable ended, and just before the guys busted loose in celebration.


	13. Harmony and counterpoint

It hadn't taken them long to go from making out on the sofa to getting more horizontal, with Bonnie comfortably arranged full length on top of Mike, neither of them in the mood to rush but both of them in the mood to fully enjoy some full-body contact for the first time in… too long. Time crept by as they ignored the concert downstairs they'd planned to check out, ignored dinner, ignored pretty much everything except each other. Then, inspired by some unknown madness, Mike erupted in a screech, yanking his hands from under Bonnie's shirt and flapping them in exaggerated alarm.

"Haylp, _HAYLP!" _he shrieked at the ceiling, "Will nobody defend my may-denly _VER_chew?" He sounded like Bette Davis with a Drano chaser.

Bonnie's head jerked up from his neck, where she'd alternately been nibbling and trailing lazy kisses.

"What the _hell_?"

He smiled up at her through narrow eyes. "Just practicin' my princess voice. Well don't _stop_, for christsake, I got more rehearsin' to do!" He closed one hand around the back of her head and pulled her down again.

Now that he'd effectively shattered their peaceful concentration, the phone could be heard. It had just rung for the third time. Unsurprisingly, it was Bonnie who took notice.

"Hey," she pulled up from Mike's greedy mouth, "the phone's ringing."

"I don't hear a thing," he replied sternly and poked a finger in her ear. "Time to get these tested."

"Cut it out Nesmith, it's _ringing_, you can't just ignore it."

"No it ain't. And yes I _can_." He locked his arms around her middle as she struggled to get up, then widened his eyes as if hypnotizing her. "Repeat after me, no phone, no phone, no phone."

_Ring, ring, ring, _four,five, six…

"Yes there _IS!" _She wrestled a hand free from where it was pinned between them, and pinched him hard on the arm.

"_OW! _God_dammit_ what's next, whips and chains?"

"Later, right now I gotta get the _phone_." She twisted out of his arms and managed to clamber off of him without kneeing him in the groin.

"If you _really_ _loved_ me you'd ignore it." No dice. Plaintive had never been his strong suit. So he shot a hand out to grab her instead. "Baby, _please_."

"Save the dramatics for the soundstage, Gwen," she advised, rolling her eyes and pulling away with a neat reverse turn of her wrist.

_Ring, ring, _seven, eight…

"I am telling you, Morris," he warned as she broke free, "if you answer that phone I am packin' up my stuff and catching the next plane home." He sat up threateningly and reached for his guitar case.

"Oh for Christsake..." She shook her head dismissively. "_No_ you're not." Then she turned away to grab up the phone on the tenth ring.

Mike dropped back on the sofa. "Well I'm glad we're back to groovy-ass normal," he griped to himself, then raised his voice again to announce, "That sound you hear is me gettin' snapped in two by the armor plate of the not even _near_ domesticated Mamadillo… cruel, _evil_ minded…"

"And just your style," she retorted, then segued smoothly to the phone, "This better be good Lulu, we were almost at two falls outta three…" Lulu controlled the house phone in the office that connected to Ari's and the other guest apartments, so Bonnie was stunned to hear Bob's voice.

"_Hey, babe, I'm glad you got it, that girl in the bar put me through but I was about to give up." _

She shot a look at Nesmith, lying silently with legs crossed, another pair of shades planted firmly over his closed eyes.

"You're not the only one," she mumbled, then suddenly shouted, "And don't 'babe' me. How the _hell _did you find me?" She barked it so loudly that Nesmith jumped a mile, grabbing at his Ray Bans before they could fall off.

"Hey, I _smashed_ those," she recalled aloud, confused. He just twiddled his fingers on the frames and smirked.

"_Huh?"_

She returned her attention to Bob.

"I said how the hell did you find me!"

"_Well I told the guys I had to speak to you, and Peter…"_ He didn't get a chance to finish.

"_Peter _told you_? _You tell that naked banjo playing hippie traitor he's a _dead man!_"

_"Naked banjo? What the… look I really need to tell you something before the press does and before Mike starts running his mouth like Karl Marx at the annual board meeting of Tools of the Bourgeois PTB."_

"Well it better be good enough to save Tork's life, believe me."

_"Better. Kirshner's through. We didn't renew his contract and I wanted to find you before the press did"_

"Don't play with me Bob, it's not fair after the week I've had." About which Bob, of course, knew nothing.

_"Not playing, babe, he's through."_

"Because of Paris?"

"_Don't flatter yourself, Bonnie, you're not __that__ good! You know as well as I do he'd reached the end of his usefulness to the show and to the band."_

_What_ did he just call them?

"I'm sorry, the connection is a little funky. Would you care to repeat that?" She knew that _he_ knew exactly what she was talking about.

"_Which part?"_

"You know which part."

_"I said the band… as in the Monkees."_

"Holy shit, you called them a 'band'. Do you have a tape running there?"

"_Very funny. So if the press gets to you, just say that you don't have any details yet."_

"Well I _don't._ Were there tears? Did he stamp his tiny feet and turn pretty colors?" She was _loving _this. She was loving even more thinking of how she was going to announce the good news to Nesmith, who was still simmering away on the sofa behind the latest in his never-ending supply of sunglasses.

"_Again, very funny. We'll cover it all when you get back. Chip is the new music director, and the guys are going to do their own thing… within reason… in the studio. Nesmith will be producing more, but for godsake don't tell him yet. And __please__, try to keep him from getting cocky with the press, okay? It's one thing not to renew Don's contract, it's another to provoke him into a slander suit."_

"I'll try, but no promises. Like you said, I'm not _that_ good." Now the pandemonium in the background was more than apparent. "I take it the rest of the guys know."

_"They're tearing up my office as we speak."_

"Put Peter on."

_"Don't be too nasty, he was outnumbered. Peter! Bonnie wants a word."_

After a second or two of general noise, Bonnie heard his nervous voice.

_"You want my balls on a plate. Honest, I swear on my mother's grave, they made me do it."_

"Your mother's alive, man. Look… I know what you did, for us here. He told me, you know, about everything that happened, and didn't. He wanted me to ask you about it, about him." She cast an eye toward the sofa, but Mike didn't look like he was listening. Not much, he wasn't.

_"You didn't need me to tell you, I knew he'd spill it one way or the other. And you already know him better than he knows himself."_

"Dunno about that, but thanks anyway."

_"So you're gonna let me live."_

A chorus of _"Save Peter Tork, save Peter Tork!"_ filtered in from the background.

"No promises. But I'll give it some thought."

"_Groovy enough. So… things okay?"_

"Okay as they can be for now."

_"Outtasight. I die happy."_

"Not yet you don't. And Pete, not to sound lame and sloppy… I really love you for it." She heard an exaggerated sigh drift over from the sofa.

_"Same here. Okay, we gotta go party."_

"Have one for me. No, have a fucking bucketful for me."

"_Your wish is my command."_ He must have handed the phone off to Bob, because she heard Peter's command of _"On, men! Drinking and wenching til dawn!"_

Then bedlam, and Bob's voice struggling in the mix, _"For Christ's sake, I can't work if I'm deaf! You got the key, take off."_

The chaos died out, and finally Bob was back on the line.

"_See you when you get back, we have some talking and planning to do. There's been some changes… Genie's the head of wardrobe now, not just the designer. And I have some plans for you too. A promotion to Associate Producer. We'll talk details a couple days before work starts up again."_

She hesitated before answering, "Why does that make me nervous?"

_"Because too much time off makes makes you weird out, which is why I hardly give you any. It's a promotion, not a death sentence."_

"That depends… I will _not_ be a tool of the PTB."

_"Christ babe I gotta get you back here before too much of Nesmith wears off on you."_

Kirshner was gone, Chip was in, the guys would be able to take credit where credit had been way too long overdue. And she had a promotion? Bonnie was more than a little stunned by so much New all at once.

"Damn, maybe I should go away more often, huh?"

_"Don't assume. Just tell that contrary Texas bastard he's got one less reason to freak out."_

She glanced over to where the Contrary Texas Bastard lay in a horizontal snit. "Don't get ahead of yourself… he'll probably find more."

_"Dig that, no question. Later."_

The line went dead, and Bonnie hung up the phone and turned toward where Nesmith was now snoring in a high, strained voice.

"Hey, Sleeping… something." She danced over to the sofa and sat on top of him, this time bouncing him with both hands on his shoulders. "I know something you don't know…" she announced in sing-song voice.

"Heard it all," he drawled, not moving. "Bob tracked ya down, and you're in love with Peter."

She lay down on top of him again, head to toe. Well not exactly, because her feet reached only a little more than halfway between his knees and ankles.

"Fine, I won't tell you." She picked up where she'd left off before the phone rang. "Mm that belly dancer extra was right, you _do_ have nice ears…"

He raised his head a little and protested, "Now see here, missy, if you think you can snack on me like a bag of Oreos, then drop me when the phone rings, and then just pick me _up_ again when you got the time, you're…" She'd begun to nibble lightly on his Adam's apple. "…right … _dammit_…" he groaned. After a few seconds of making him crazy, she stopped, which almost killed him.

"Forgetting for a minute that you have the most perverse turn-on spots ever… don't you wanna know why Bob called?" She pulled his shades up and off and tossed them (gently) onto the armchair nearby. "Not even a _little_ bit?"

"Okay, I give up. What did that tone-deaf slave-driving motherfucker want _this_ time?"

Bonnie laughed and dropped down to whisper in his ear. "Kirshner's gone."

"Hell is _that _all? Big deal, he always comes back sooner or later. Or Bob'll just replace him with a _bigger_ clueless asshole." He sat up abruptly, and Bonnie would have tumbled to the floor if he hadn't caught her and pulled her back up next to him.

She tugged on his arm and insisted, "Not this time. His contract wasn't renewed. Chip's in as music director, and Kirshner's _out. _Bob wanted to tell me before I saw it in the paper, or before the press found me. You know that little prick will announce it to the world as if it was his idea and every reporter will want 'reaction'." She segued back to seductive mode, running her arm around his back and kissing the side of his face, reaching the other hand up to trail fingers in his hair. "But I need to ask you for a favor…"

"Lemme guess. He told you to make sure I don't trash Kirshner to the press." He didn't look pleased, turning away.

"C'mon, it's not a gag order. But we don't need him suing for slander, or whatever else he can come up with. Okay?" He didn't respond at first, so she tried unsuccessfully to turn his face toward her. "_Okay?_"

A grouchy sound emerged before he answered. "Okay." When he faced her to repeat it, she leaned in to grab a kiss.

"Gotcha."

"That's _my_ line, Morris," he grumbled as he grabbed her and wrestled her into his arms, announcing, "Well guess what, we are gonna celebrate this mind bending event. Tomorrow night, you and me and Lulu and Ari and whoever else wants to party. Last time I was here, there was this real nice Italian place… the owner gave me his card, said the next meal was on him, to bring my friends and all."

"I'll bet he did… well he'll be stuck with the famous Mike Nesmith, a production lackey,and a bunch of locals. Got the card on you?"

He pointed toward the bedroom. "In my wallet."

Bonnie sprang from Mike's arms and ran to the bedroom to grab his fancy tooled leather billfold from the bureau. She found the card jammed in with a bunch of random scraps of paper covered with handwritten notes, a fat wad of twenties and fifties, and a couple of credit cards.

"No phone numbers? You're slipping, man!" she hollered down the hall. Then his driver's license caught her eye. "Hey Nesmith, you gotta get this renewed this year or I'm gonna be driving that sports car, not you!" _Wait a minute… _She looked at the birth date, then looked again. Walking into the living room still holding the wallet, she asked, "Is this right?"

"Is what right?"

"The date here says December thirtieth, nineteen forty-two."

She followed him as he got up and went to the kitchen to get a beer from the fridge then returned to the sofa. "Yeah, that's right. Why?" By the time he remembered, it was too late. _Oh shit._

"Because you told me you're twenty seven. Which would be nineteen forty."

"Yeah, well," he took the wallet from her and set it on the end table, with nothing else to say about it.

"So the PR department didn't shave two years off, like you said, for the teenyboppers. You really _are_ twenty-five?" He nodded, taking a slug from his beer to cover his embarrassment. "So why'd you say you were twenty seven?" She was completely baffled. "Why jive me about two years?"

First he shrugged, then he put down the beer but didn't look her in the eye. "I guess I thought you might not take me seriously, so I added a couple years."

"But if I remember correctly, we were kind of like in _bed_, when you told me. That first morning, after a night that coulda got us a Swedish film contract. That's about as serious as it _gets_, right?"

"Not in my experience."

Suddenly, she got it. On the list of things that comprised Mike Nesmith's life, sex had quite possibly been the most anti-serious of them all. Sex was a mindless diversion, the spoils of fame. Revenge on (or penance for) a bad marriage. Or maybe a drug. What it hadn't ever been was a sign of "serious".

"But if I wasn't taking you seriously I wouldn't have _been _there," she protested.

"I stand corrected."

So he said. But what she saw on his face and in his eyes was nowhere near that. It was a mix of things she couldn't read. They weren't really hers to read anyway, or to try to make sense of, so she didn't try.

Instead she reassured, "I take you seriously, I always have, from the first ten words we spoke to each other. All of it, all of you." He was looking at her earnestly, if uneasily, so she walked to him, reaching out to pick up his shades from the chair where she'd flung them.

"Your mind, your words, your songs," she told him, "that one smile you have that reaches your eyes and that tells me I'm the grooviest chick ever. The way you want so bad and try so hard to make the music just right, make _us_ just right…" By now she was standing over him, and what she saw in his eyes was so painfully complex she felt like a voyeur, so she gently slipped the shades over them. "The way you need these to keep some things to yourself. All of you, I take all of you seriously."

"Damn. All that, huh?" He was almost smiling again.

"And your pants. I take your pants _very_ seriously," she informed him, straddling his knees and pulling his shades off again, smoothing all that dark hair back away from his face with both hands. "On _and_ off." When he linked his hands behind her back and nodded gravely it felt wonderful. It felt _normal_.

"Serious, huh?" he asked.

She nodded and leaned down to whisper "_Siempre_. Now gimme some sugar and let's catch the second set."

He pulled her mouth to his for a series of slow kisses, then rubbed his face against her cheek. "How about I give you _more_ sugar, and we skip the second set," he breathed against her skin. "_Seriously._"

She jumped up and shook her head. "Nope. Nes you know I _love_ my work and I _love_ your music, all of you guys' music, but I am dying to hear something untouched by Kirshner and no offense, also untouched by Monkees, plural." As he followed her to the door she added, "Oh, by the way, Bob called you guys a band."

"Well hell we _are _a band," he clattered down the stairs after her. "That ain't news."

She stopped as they reached the club door and turned to face him. "Well this is… I got a promotion. I'm now Associate Producer. Whadda ya have to say to _that?_"

He stared for a minute, then opened the door and gave her a light shove through. "I say belly up to the bar, mama, I need a _drink_."


	14. Out take

"Associate producer, huh, so what's _that_ anyway?" Lulu asked as she and Bonnie rummaged through racks of second hand clothing at a Greenwich Village boutique.

"Wrangling the press, playing go-between with the writers and tech and wardrobe, setting up photo ops and interviews, road managing odds and ends, like that. How's this look?" She put on a set of orange shades and a wide fedora, and threw a multicolored boa around her neck.

"Like Janis, only sober. So you'll be doing what you're doing now, but more of it, with a fancy schmancy title?"

"And with a fatter paycheck, Bob said we're gonna meet about the details when I get back to L.A."

Lulu snorted. "Yeah, heard that one at my other gig at the corner bar, just before my paycheck bounced."

"Cut it out, I have a contract. We're not talking low-rent here." Bonnie caught Lulu rolling her eyes.

"Don't jive me, sister," Lulu countered, "Isn't he the one you dumped your drink on in Paris?"

They'd been spending enough time together for Bonnie to have filled Lulu in on all manner of inside dirt, and Bonnie knew Lulu would take it to the grave with her. Which was just as well, since she had some trouble keeping the details straight.

"_No_, that was Kirshner!" Bonnie paused to mime spitting on the ground like a gypsy avoiding the evil eye. "Bob's the one who's basically okay but kind of clueless when it comes to throwing his weight around."

"Uh-huh. Oh, right… Mike thinks he's a jerk."

"No, Mike thinks he's the Artistic _Antichrist_ and the Source of All Evil in the world."

They kept rummaging as they talked.

"Kinda simplistic, huh," Lulu observed. "Antichrist and all that."

"Musicians," Bonnie shrugged, "whaddaya gonna do. To some of 'em the world is all black or white, 1, 2, 3, a, b-flat, c. I can't say I don't agree sometimes, but there are better ways to get Bob on your side than getting up in his face. Push him, he pushes back. Nesmith's gotta learn some existential judo."

"And you're just the one to teach him?" Lulu looked hopeful.

"Nah, but it's getting so's I can slow him down now and then. Peter might be the only one who can _teach_ him, and even that's a long rocky road."

"Y'know I saw Peter Tork play a few times around the Village. Never at Strings, but around. Man, he can play anything he picks up."

"Including women," Bonnie laughed, then faked an angelic expression. "But always in the most _spiritual_ sense!"

They both howled with laughter at that one. Lulu saw enough musicians in her work to know that even the most hippie-karma among them were not above indulging in the sexual perks of the business.

Suddenly something hanging on a crowded rack of accessories caught Lulu's eye. "AHA!" She raced to the rack and snatched up a long silk scarf of psychedelic paisley, its ends sewn with a fringe of crystal beads and tiny silver bells. "Perfect!" She grabbed Bonnie and reached it around her waist, tying it at one side, then stood back and looked at her friend. In her time back in the Village – and in Lulu's company – Bonnie had drifted away from the t-shirt-and-blue-jeans look and back to the "beads and spangles" that Nesmith teased her about. Today she was wearing red velour bell bottoms and a hand-embroidered red-on-black Indian tunic.

"Groovy personified," Lulu announced. "Hey, man, we're gonna take this!" she called to the young hippie who ran the shop.

"Let's see," he ruminated, as if trying to remember something. "Sascha put a lotta work into that… five bucks." When Bonnie and Lulu reached into their shoulder bags simultaneously, the guy pulled up short.

"Hey, I know you," he said.

"Yeah, I work at Strings up the block," Lulu told him, surreptitiously waving a pinched thumb and forefinger behind her back at Bonnie to denote "stoned".

"No, _you,_" he pointed at Bonnie. "You work on that freaked-out Monkees show, right? Man, that is the _wildest_. My friends and me, we get high and watch it every week."

She laughed out loud. "They will be more than proud to hear that." She pulled a twenty out of the leather cash pouch stashed in her bag. "Here, smoke one on me. But for christsake don't tell the press!"

"Too late. See that guy over there?" He pointed to a similar-looking bearded guy checking out the second hand albums in the corner. "He writes for the Voice. Hey, Ramon! C'mere, this lady works with the Monkees."

Bonnie dropped her face in her hands until Lulu whispered, "Now's your chance to wrangle!"

Ramon the Reporter looked up, and focused like a laser. "Hey, right." He strode over and extended his hand. "Bonnie Morris, right? I'm Ramon Mendes, from the Voice."

Bonnie shook the offered hand automatically. "Hey, nice to meetcha, look I'm just here on a little vacation and my friend and me gotta go…"

"Setting up for that Mike Nesmith solo gig at Strings Attached, I'll bet." When Bonnie's eyes bugged out of her head, he laughed. "Wow, don't wig out. Word gets around."

Lulu shrank for a moment under Bonnie's poisonous glare, then stepped up and declared, "It wasn't me!"

"Nah, just some random volunteer, saw him practicing some riffs when the club was closed and put it together." Ramon held up a copy of the Post opened to the gossip page. "So any truth to this?"

Bonnie squinted and read: "'What tall dark and mercurial member of TV's hottest quartet is holed up in a New York apartment with the boss's assistant?'" She gaped at the squib and rolled her eyes. "_Seriously?_ Where do they get this crap?" Which was, of course, true, but why give him his own story?

"Maybe here?" He indicated two photos of her and Nesmith, obviously taken the day they'd gone to the Central Park boating pond. "To act like tourists," he'd promised, and they had. The photo caught the two of them standing by the edge of the water, when Nesmith had begun to push Bonnie in and leaned over to grab her back at the last second. His back was mostly to the camera, but the side of his ever-shaded face was not quite obscured by the unmistakable wave of dark hair. Bonnie, on the other hand, was clearly visible and grabbing onto him for dear life. The second, taken seconds later, showed her staring up at him, her arms around his waist and fingers laced through his belt loops, as he bent to mollify her with a kiss.

Lulu examined the photos. "At least they got his good side," she noted, indicating the rear view of Mike's tight jeans in the first one.

"So, what about it?" Ramon persisted. "When's the gig? And are you guys really shacked up here in the Village? Oh, yeah, and I heard that lame bubble gum peddler Don Kirshner got the axe."

Bonnie resisted the urge to knock the paper to the floor and run like hell. Instead, she wrangled.

"Mr. Nesmith is in town shopping for some rare guitars," she lied smoothly. "The proprietor of Strings Attached is an old friend of mine, so I decided to come along and visit. Mr. Lowenstein was kind enough to offer his artist apartments to Mr. Nesmith and myself while we're in town. I don't have any details regarding Mr. Kirshner's departure except that his contract was not renewed by mutual agreement. As for that rumor of a gig, I think you're adding up the parts wrong."

Lulu had taken her arm and they were edging toward the door, Ramon the Reporter in not-so-subtle pursuit.

"You sure that's all? I can give you some great publicity," he offered eagerly.

Bonnie stopped in her tracks. This guy was clearly a rookie. "Ramon my man, we got a gold record, an Emmy nomination, a hot TV show and sold out concerts whenever we feel like going on the road. A Grammy on the way, unless we fall into the Twilight Zone. Publicity, we _don't _need. Down time, that's another story."

Ramon looked as if he were awaiting a revelation. "Yeah…? So you're saying?"

"_No comment_!" She and Lulu bolted out the door and down the sidewalk, the ends of Bonnie's new scarf trailing echoes of tinkling crystal and bells. When they reached the back door of Strings they doubled over in breathless hysterics.

"Got a new item for them," Lulu gasped when she could finally speak, "'What overworked associate producer and nameless sidekick did the _jive dance_ all around a Village Voice reporter today'?"

In the midst of their hysterics, Bonnie suddenly found herself near tears. "My god Lu, have I told you how much I've missed you?" She threw her arms around the shorter woman and the two of them hugged tight.

When Lulu stepped back, she said plainly, "I was missing you before you left, Siobhan-y." The hybrid name was Lulu's compromise between her friend's old life and the new one she'd found after losing Benny and going to L.A. "Baby doll, you left _you_ before you left here. Welcome back, to everything. Now let's go see what kinda trouble Tall Dark and Mercurial and the boss are getting up to."

They were still laughing as they traipsed into the club arm-in-arm.


	15. Intro

"Aha, you're back! Come here, and tell Mr. Rock Star he can't hire anything better than what we have!" Ari was, in classic terminology, in high dudgeon.

Two of the other staff were standing awkwardly nearby as Ari gestured furiously. Mike was leaning on the bar, head in hands, muttering. As Lulu and Bonnie approached they could hear his last words.

"Ari, man, I didn't mean to insult anybody. It's just, well, I want to give you a good show, and I want to cover it myself, after all you've done…"

Ari was not moved. "After all I've done, young man, you could show me the respect of trusting my word!"

"Uh-oh," Bonnie whispered to Lulu as they drew near, "Looks like Nesmith has unleashed the Wrath of Ari."

"Tell him," Ari demanded, of Lulu and/or Bonnie. "Tell him we have the finest musicians standing right here, _more_ than good enough to back him up on Friday night."

Bonnie stepped up. "Didn't he tell you that Brian the dishwasher drums good enough to make Micky cry and use his sticks for kindling? And Jack here, who wastes his time waiting tables, is also a bass player that could match Peter bottom for bottom?"

Lulu punched Bonnie in the arm none too gently.

"Oh, right, and Lulu here is a guitar ace, and… wait for it… goddess of the five string banjo?"

Finally Mike straightened, his face a mix of determination and remorse. "Yeah, he did. But I figured why not spare no expense?"

"Because what we have here is priceless!" Ari protested, obviously trying to throttle down from a roar.

Bonnie stepped between them, concerned more for hurt feelings than anyone's safety.

"Nesmith, listen and listen good because I'm telling you this for your own good. Your money's no good here. And Ari's right, these are the best pick up side men – and women – that can be had within a hundred miles."

Looking entirely outnumbered, he was still determined to do it it his way. "I believe you, but…"

She reached up and patted a disconcerted, bearded cheek. "Don't object so much, Nesmith. You'll live longer."

Defeated, he addressed Ari and the others. "Okay, you're in. Look, I'm sorry, no disrespect meant. I only have a basic set list laid out and," he shot a look at Bonnie, "I'd appreciate some more ideas. Okay?"

Ari was still regaining his composure, but nodded. "Very okay. I forgive you because you are new in town." Then he smiled broadly, and patted Bonnie's head. "And because you are here with my Siobhan. Set up and rehearse at your pleasure," he invited, waving a hand at the empty stage. "We have no performers coming in tonight or tomorrow. Your performance is yours to perfect until Friday." Then he shook a stern finger at Mike and his newly acquired backup band. "Sound check at 6pm. No excuses!" He departed to his office.

"When do you want to start?" Mike asked the others.

"Gimme a couple of hours to get my kit here and set up," Brian requested, and looked to Lulu and Jack. "That okay for you guys?"

"Yeah," Lulu said, and Jack nodded in agreement. "Heads are harder to adjust than strings."

Bonnie laughed out loud. "You got _that_ right, Lu!"

As the others took off, Bonnie turned back to Mike. "Well done. Mellow is an acquired habit, but you're learning."

He laughed, mostly at himself, then smiled down at her and pulled her closer. "If I said you had a foxy body, would you hold it against me?"

She leaned in. "Every chance I get. But only if I get some sugar first."

He complied, with enthusiasm.

"Mmm, hate to eat and run, but Genie's expecting me to call, we're going over some ideas for the fairy tale epi."

As she pulled away Mike's brow knitted in concern. "Why does that make me uptight?"

"Trust me Gwen, I'm the _Associate Producer_." She was really getting off on throwing the title around, in certain limited company. "If you don't look good, _I_ don't look good. And I intend for us both to look _very_ good!"

Laughing, she ran off toward the stairs. Mike picked up his set list and notes, and would have gone to fine tune the Gretsch backstage, but Lulu reappeared, dangling the keys to the club van. "C'mon, Rock Star. We got a couple of hours, there's somebody I want you to meet."

* * *

She didn't explain as they drove. By the time they'd reached the gates of the Salem Fields Cemetery in Brooklyn, Mike decided that waiting for answers would be smarter than asking for them.

They walked some distance through areas that ranged from crowded with gravestones, through opulent mausoleums, to a place that looked to Mike as if it were set deliberately under the sycamore tree that shaded the two stones and green area beyond.

"Siobhan would've taken you here sooner or later, but I wanted you to come sooner," Lulu told Mike as they stood before two simple granite stones. One read: "Ruth Greenberg Lowenstein, Beloved wife of Ari" Beneath that inscription was another in Hebrew. "It says 'the lord watch between me and thee, while we are absent from one another.' It's called the Mizpah."

"Ruth… that was Ari's wife. He talks about her as if she's still with him."

"Oh, she _is_. He consults her all the time, and she never lets him down." Lulu paused to study Mike for signs of _what a freak_. "It's not crazy. It's life," she added just in case.

"Right on. My friend Peter, he's not Jewish but he's talking about that all the time. Death isn't absence… not spiritually anyway." Then he was leaning down to look at the other stone. This one was inscribed entirely in English.

"Benjamin Joseph Morris, Chosen Son, Cherished Half of a Heart, Eternal Friend."

Mike took a breath before observing, "That's Benny. But the rest of it…"

"Ari and Ruth never had kids of their own. Sometimes you _can_ choose your family, and Ari chose Siobhan and BJ, like he's chosen some of us luckier ones you've met here. When Siobhan told us about the accident, Ari insisted on bringing him home, on taking care of everything, and he said there was no place else he would rest except here. You've seen yourself, it's useless to argue." After he nodded, smiling, she continued. "Half of a heart means half of Siobhan's. And Eternal Friend... well you don't know us real well yet but I think you can guess that when you fall in, you're in for life."

"But Bonnie isn't Jewish, how did he get…"

"A gentile in here? Easy. He lied. He said BJ converted. They don't ask for paperwork on that kind of thing. He told us, 'God can't object to a worthy lie made for love.' The empty place next to it…"

Mike tried to conceal a shudder. "For Bonnie."

Lulu reached out and gripped his hand. "Only if she had nowhere else to go. I don't think he's worried about that anymore. It may take a while to find out where you belong but once you do, that's it. When Siobhan left, here was the only place she'd ever belonged, until she found a new one. I've known Ari longer than anyone here, and believe me... he isn't worried about her anymore."

* * *

When he got back to #3, Mike found Bonnie asleep on the sofa, her notebook dangling from one hand on the floor. Unlike every other nap he'd caught her in, she was stretched out full length, head resting easily to one side. In that moment she looked so perfectly peaceful he wished mightily he had Peter's camera to take a picture he could hang on the wall, to remind him of what getting it right looked like. Then again, if he managed to keep getting it right, she'd be right there to remind him herself.

He bent to take the notebook from her hand, and laid it on the end table. Then he sat in the nearby armchair, content to watch her sleep until rehearsal forced him to leave.


	16. Closing night

Ari nudged Bonnie where she sat next to him at the ringside table as the sound check was ending. "You're _kvelling._"

"Yeah? So?" As sometimes happened when Nesmith was playing, she quickly got drawn right in, sitting with chin in hand, staring in wonder like some goofy fan.

"So nothing." He patted her cheek, then sat back and smiled warmly. "It's just nice to see, after so long."

She looked at the stage again, and then back at Ari. "It's nice to feel it, too." Embarrassed, she gestured toward the stage. "And plenty for _you _to _kvell_ over, huh? They're gonna _kill _'em tonight!"

The last-chance pickup band and Mike sounded better than even they had expected. The set list they'd put together ran the gamut from Chuck Berry, to Jackie Wilson (without the brass), through Patsy Cline. Also thrown in were a number of his B-sides and the songs they'd premiered in Paris, Bonnie's complaints about "Monkee music" notwithstanding. It was running a little late, though, and Bonnie pointed to her watch and called to the stage, "Guys, doors should be opening in ten minutes. Back in your cage until showtime."

Mike glanced up from where he'd been in a huddle with the others. "Relax, Morris, in case you forgot I've done this before, but with a bigger side order of crazy."

He was right about that. In spite of the fact that the truth of the "TBA" gig had leaked – no, _surged_ – to the public, the crowd waiting outside was less wild than the screaming mob that usually greeted the guys. Oh, they were excited and making some noise, but under their own control. It helped that in the end Ari was forced to sell tickets the day before, in order to keep the crowd within the fire laws. Most of the tables had been removed except for three near the stage for off-duty staff, a couple of press, and for himself (taking the night off at last) and Bonnie. The rest of the room was filled with rows of folding chairs borrowed from other friendly clubs, whose staff were given preferential access to tickets. One hundred-fifty in all, at five bucks a head, to be used to fund other concerts. In the end Mike convinced Ari to let him hire a professional soundman and equipment. "If I'm gonna give you a show, it's gonna be done right, dammit. Besides, you don't want your people to sound like amateurs."

"I guess maybe the crazy mob thing is kind of like math," Bonnie observed to Ari, "it increases exponentially until you reach four Monkees. Crazy to the Fourth Monkee Power." She glanced back toward the club entrance, and could see at least some of the people through the small window next to the door. Girls, most of them. She couldn't help wondering how many of them had met Nesmith under more _intimate_, if anonymous, circumstances. For some reason the thought just made her smile. "The villagers are waving their pitchforks, you guys! Get a move on!"

* * *

"I don't mind doing the last one cold, Lulu," Mike debated with Lulu in a low voice. "Why does it matter if we do it now? She's gonna hear it either way."

"The last one" being Mike's newest creation. He'd only just finished the lyric and the tag to his satisfaction a few hours ago while Bonnie was helping to set up the club for the gig.

Lulu grabbed Mike by his guitar strap and pulled him down so she could glare in his eyes. "Look, Rock Star," she demanded, "the first time you kissed Siobhan, did you do it in front of a full house?"

"_Huh?_" He tried to pull back but she was stronger than she looked. "No I did not, not that it's any of your… oh. Right."

"Yeah, right. Let her hear it before the rest of the world does. Even though we _know_ you don't write 'em for _anyone_." She released him, and stood back with a laugh. "Not much you don't."

"Man," Mike muttered, "I'm beginnin' to see why you two hang so tight." He nodded to the others. "Okay, boss lady says one more." With no introduction, he turned back to the microphone and counted in.

"One, two, one-two-three …"

* * *

Bonnie sat back as if hit by a wave. Which she was, as she felt the cascading riff wash over her, the one she'd been hearing one way or another for weeks now. Lulu had swapped her banjo for a Dobro and the triple set of strings backed with quiet snare and cymbals filled the room like rolling water. But it wasn't until he started to sing that she really went under.

* * *

_I've known for a long time the kind of girl you are_

_Of a smile that covers teardrops, the way your head yields to your heart_

_Of things you've kept inside  
_

_That most girls couldn't bear_

_I've known you for a long time, but I've just begun to care_

* * *

If Bonnie had been able to tear herself away from Nesmith as the song continued, she'd have seen Ari looking from her, to Mike, and back again, as if he'd just been given the finest gift of his recent life. Mike was staring at the frets as he sang, as if he were still learning the fingering. As if anyone present believed that.

* * *

_I know I've been blind_

_To not have loved you all this time._

_But the image of you wasn't clear,_

_I guess I've been standing too near._

_Well it's taken me a while, but I have finally found_

_What you mean to me, and that's what really counts._

_And what you mean to me is something we can share_

_I've known you for a long time, but I've just begun to care_

_I've known you for a long time but I've just… begun… to care._

* * *

Then the beautifully rolling notes finished, and the echo faded to the back of the room. It took a few seconds for someone to break the silence.

"Damn," one of the waiters murmured. "What's that called, man?"

Without thinking, Bonnie volunteered, "Propinquity."

Mike looked up and smiled at her. "Good a name as any."

* * *

Things transitioned back to the real world of the gig about to happen. Mike wheeled on Lulu and demanded, "_Happy_ now?" Lulu just rolled her eyes, unstrapped her Dobro and headed to the small room that served as a backstage area. The others followed as Mike set his Gretsch in the stand at center stage, and hopped down to approach Bonnie. Ari had shrewdly gone to check on things behind the bar.

"That wasn't for you," Mike told her. "I don't write 'em _for _anyone."

"I know," Bonnie nodded, entirely without guile. "They just 'come together' sometimes."

"Glad you understand. C'mere," he drew her up and into the longest, warmest, deepest kiss that she could remember getting while fully clothed. She felt herself going over backward, and held on tight as Nesmith literally laid her down across the table and bent over to finish with full-upper body contact. She was only vaguely aware of the sound of people coming in as he lifted her to her feet again, and neither one of them noticed the camera flash.

"Jesus, Nesmith," she gasped a little ruefully, "not fair to start something you can't finish."

"Oh, I'll finish it later, don't worry. Besides," he added and turned her around to face the advancing sea of mostly girls. "There's some familiar faces in the crowd." He leaned down to whisper in her ear, "No sense lettin' them get their hopes up."

"Right on, cowboy." She whipped around to seize him by the collar, buried one hand in his thick dark hair, and nearly sucked the tongue out of him, then shoved him back again.

"God_damn _baby, leave me something to sing with, will ya?" He laughed then, and bellowed across the room, "And I ain't no goddamn _cowboy_!"

* * *

Lulu and Bonnie were locked in a bone-crushing hug at the departure gate, overlapping promises to come to LA and/or return to New York just as soon as possible, that no way would so much time get in the way again.

"Besides," Lulu announced when they finally released each other, "Mike said he's gonna get me session gigs for the new tracks."

Mike, who'd been swapping his own thanks and assurances with Ari, snapped to attention. "Now hold _on_ a minute…. I said _what?_"

"You know you need someone as good as me to back up that bunch of TV stars you run with." The gleam in her eye shut down Mike's protests.

"Right, why don't you get our number from the Associate Producer here." He picked the tiny Lulu right up off of her feet and gave her a hug, then released her with a laugh. "She'd _love_ to fatten up Bob's payroll."

The final call for their flight came over the loudspeaker, and Bonnie grabbed onto Ari in a near-desperate embrace.

"You know you're stuck with me for good, now. No more running. And you're gonna come out to the coast and show 'em how it's done." She stood there staring at him, out of words.

"What's this?" Ari asked, touching the corner of her eye, smiling gently.

"Allergies, I got allergies!" Bonnie insisted.

Mike draped an arm around her and hauled her away. "C'mon Morris, they can't miss you if you won't go away. Later, guys."

* * *

Somewhere over the Midwest, Mike was pulled from his reading when Bonnie leaned her head against his shoulder.

"_So _much starts up again when we get home," she sighed.

He looked closely at her. "You okay with all that?"

"Oh, yeah."

He smiled and lifted his arm, pulling her across so she was lying in his lap.

"Good. Now when we get back how about you slip into something more comfortable... like my place."

She knew he didn't just mean for the night. Things were definitely headed back on track, but...

"I _do_ love you, Michael."

He tapped her nose and replied, "Good to know, 'cause I _do_ love you back."

"But I need to give it a little more time, okay?"

"Is _that_ all? I got all the time you need, Morris."

_Something else to work on,_ he thought to himself, actually looking forward to the challenge, silent for a moment as he considered how he might convince her._  
_

"Hey. What's going on in that dark head of yours?"

"Just ponderin' the future. You're gonna be crackin' the whip, and I'm gonna be dressed like a chick. What could go wrong?"

"Are you high?" she burst out in disbelief. "Just _pick_ something." When she stopped rolling her eyes and looked up into his sly smile she sighed in exasperation, "Nesmith, what am I gonna _do_ with you?"

"How about this..."

The way she held on tight as they kissed told him he was maybe, _finally,_ beginning to get it right.

* * *

_kvelling (_Yiddish) - to beam with immense pride and pleasure


End file.
